


she's gotta be strong to fight them

by stars_inthe_sky



Series: tell me where your strength lies [1]
Category: Terminator (Movies), Terminator - All Media Types, Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, The Terminator (1984)
Genre: Alternate Canon, Alternate Timelines, Apocalypse, Bechdel Test Pass, Episode: s02e22 Born to Run, Families of Choice, Gen, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Pre-Apocalypse, Survival Training, Training, Unconventional Families
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-08
Updated: 2013-08-08
Packaged: 2017-12-22 20:00:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 25,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/917447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stars_inthe_sky/pseuds/stars_inthe_sky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Sarah rises and hugs her so tightly that Savannah’s wet towel soaks through her sweater. “What did you mean, before, I saved your life?” Savannah asks, voice muffled by Sarah’s shoulder. “I didn’t do anything.”</i>
</p><p>After “Born to Run,” they’re just a kid without a mom and a mom without a kid. But a storm is still coming. (First in a series)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 2009

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing and no one recognizable and I am only profiting from this work emotionally. 
> 
> This timeline diverges from those discussed throughout the series, given the events of “Born to Run,” but many events, characters, and places from other canonical timelines are incorporated. Characters’ ages and other attributes are based on canon (as confirmed by the incredibly helpful folks behind the [Terminator Wiki](http://terminator.wikia.com/wiki/Terminator_Wiki)) or on the actors who play them (per IMDb). 
> 
> Story title is from “[Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Part I](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoshimi_Battles_the_Pink_Robots,_Pt._1)” by the Flaming Lips and series title is from Shirley Manson’s cover of the song “[Samson and Delilah](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samson_and_Delilah_\(song\)).” 
> 
> My sincerest thanks to [redrackham87](http://redrackham87.tumblr.com/), my once and future beta, and to [raktajinos](http://raktajinos.livejournal.com) for the [truly breathtaking artwork](http://archiveofourown.org/works/934683). 
> 
> Thanks also to Virginia Hankins, [real-life lady knight and badass redhead](http://virginiahankins.com/), for having a face that looks like Savannah's should.

** 2009 **

Usually one of Mommy’s drivers picks her up from gymnastics, but today it’s Mr. Ellison.

“Are we going to the office? Can I play with John Henry?” Savannah jumps into the front seat on the off-chance he won’t stop her (Mommy says it’s not safe for an eight-year-old to sit there) and yanks the door shut.

Mr. Ellison is silent for several seconds, eyes focused on the road like he doesn’t know the answer to her question. Finally, he says, “Yes, but I don’t know about John Henry.”

He doesn’t say anything else, and Savannah knows when adults want her to be quiet, so she stares at the sunny asphalt ahead and rehearses her floor routine in her head.

When they arrive at the Zeira Corp building, Mr. Ellison leaves his car with an attendant and they take the elevator down to the basement where John Henry lives, instead of Mommy’s office upstairs. But John Henry isn’t there at all—his whole room looks burnt like toast, and the big computers are all dark. Sarah from the attack at her house, sits on the floor in the middle of an ashy circle, trailing her fingers dazedly through the dust and ignoring Cameron’s unmoving body, which is flopped haphazardly across John Henry’s chair.

Savannah lets out a quiet gasp and freezes on the spot. Sarah looks up then, and her whole demeanor changes—she looks softer and sadder, and moves with a purpose toward Savannah, kneeling so they’re roughly at eye level. Mr. Ellison is a comforting presence standing behind her. But Sarah’s nice, she remembers—Sarah saved her, and her son John, and Cameron—and Mr. Ellison won’t let her get hurt.

Savannah’s whole body shakes, but she stammers, “Where’s John Henry? And—and Mommy? And what happened to—”

Both adults glace at Cameron, then at each other, before turning back to her.

“Savannah,” Sarah says. “I’m going to be as honest with you as I can, and I’m going to keep you safe, just like at your house the other day. Okay? But I need you to promise me something.”

Savannah blinks.

“I need you to promise me that, whatever happens, no matter how scared you get, that you’ll try to be brave. Okay? Can you do that?”

Savannah twists her head to look up at Mr. Ellison, who nods at her and smiles weakly. She looks back to Sarah. “Oh—okay. But I—I don’t know how to...”

“I’ll teach you, okay? I promise. But when I tell you what happened today, and what’s going to happen, I need you to—to listen to me, and not to cry. You have to trust me, Savannah, and I will protect you with everything I have.”

She takes Savannah’s hands in her own. They’re rough with broken skin but warm, and her grip is gentle. Savannah thinks of Mommy’s cold hands and shivers. “I promise.”

“Okay,” Sarah says. “Okay. Do you know about time travel? Like, from the movies?” Savannah nods and she continues. “Well, it’s real. In the future, there are—there are these very bad robots, like the one that tried to hurt you at your house the other day. They’re called Skynet. And the people—they fight back, and one day they win, so Skynet starts sending robots back in time to stop those people. But the humans send people back, too, so they can help us fight back now, in our time, and keep everybody that we can safe. And sometimes there are good robots, like Cameron and John Henry, and they help us, too—she got hurt helping us today— but most of them are bad.

“One of those people who came back gave us—John and me—we had a list of people that Skynet was trying to hurt, and you were on it. That means, one day, you’re going to help save a lot of people and beat Skynet. They wanted to hurt John, too, because he’s supposed to lead the human resistance.

“So, when we leave here, I want you to come with me, and I can teach you everything I know, so you can help save everybody from Skynet one day. I can teach you how to be brave, Savannah, and how to protect yourself, and anybody else who comes along. We have to be ready— _you_ have to be ready. And it’s not safe to stay here anymore, so we’ll leave—we’ll get away somewhere they won’t find us, and we’ll get ready. Does that make sense? Do you understand me?”

Savannah nods again. She still has bruises from John Henry’s hand on her wrist, and the memory of a dead man in the living room is stark. That robots can be bad makes sense. But why's Cameron here, and not John Henry? And… “What about Mommy? And—and—”

Mr. Ellison says, “Your Mommy is…well, she’s…gone.”

“Gone like—like, _dead_? Like Daddy?”

“No,” he says at the same time Sarah says, “Yes.” They exchange another grownup look before Sarah speaks again.

“Yes. This isn’t going to be easy, Savannah, but—when your dad died in the helicopter accident? Your mom died that day, too, we think. We think Skynet want to hurt them so you wouldn’t ever be born—that’s what they tried to do to me and John—but they got the date wrong.”

“But—”

“The woman who was supposed to be your mom—she wasn’t a woman. She was a robot, a—a very, very advanced one. Like John Henry, only she could change what she looked like. So she could pretend to be anybody, including your mom.”

“So—”

“Did she ever seem…I don’t know, cold to you? Or mean? Or confused or mad when you did things you didn’t know were bad?” Savannah’s involuntary shudder is answer enough, apparently. “We don’t know what she was trying to do, with you or with John Henry. She probably protected you, if Skynet was trying to hurt you before a couple of days ago. If she wanted to kill you, she would have. So I’m not sure what she was doing, but…whatever she was, she took him and—and my son. They went to the future. I don’t know when, or where, or if we’ll see them again, or if they’ll ever come back, or…but they’re gone.

“That’s why I need you to trust me, Savannah—because we don’t know. We don’t know why they left, or why your name was on that list. And I will do everything in my power to make sure that when we find out, you’re ready.”

***

Hours later, she’s in the front seat of Sarah’s car, half-asleep, with a dark, dusty road stretching out before them. Sarah reaches over periodically to stroke her hair or to squeeze her shoulder, and the small gestures make Savannah feel warm and wanted, even if she’s still tense and nervous.

After saying goodbye to Mr. Ellison, they had snuck out of the building in the trunk of his car and gone to Savannah’s house, where Sarah gave her ten minutes and a suitcase to fill with anything she wants. She chose mostly clothing but stuffs in a plush puppy in when she thought Sarah wasn’t looking.

Sarah put a picture of Savannah’s parents into the suitcase, too. Savannah is fairly sure she’s supposed to be sad that her Mommy is dead or gone or both, but she mostly feels relieved.

It sort of makes sense that Mommy—Cold Mommy—was a robot, and she’s glad Sarah came and took her away from that. The idea of never going home again, or seeing Mr. Ellison again, or even going to school and gymnastics, doesn’t quite seem real, not yet at least, but the last few days have been so scary that the promise of learning how to be brave is captivating, as is Sarah’s willingness to hold her hand when they stop for food, gas, and a bathroom along the road.

Savannah only realizes she’s fallen asleep when Sarah shakes her awake. She rubs sleep from her eyes in the rising sunlight and finds they’re parked in front of a lighthouse, ringed by grass—crushed and brown in many places, but homey—and backed by still ocean waters. It’s easily the most beautiful place Savannah has ever seen, and she turns to Sarah with a tentative, hopeful smile.

Sarah grins back, exhausted but genuine. “Yep, baby girl, this is going to be home for a while.”

“I’m not a baby,” Savannah points out. “You just said I was supposed to be brave, and not—”

Sarah ducks her head in apology. “Sorry, I just—my mom used to call me that. Even when I wasn’t a baby anymore…it’s just a pet name, you know? ‘Sarah’ doesn’t really shorten to any nicknames. But you’re right, you’re not a baby.”

“It’s—it’s okay. If you want to call me that,” Savannah says hesitantly. “My name doesn’t really shorten to anything, either. Mommy never gave me any nicknames.”

“Well…do you want to see the inside, then, baby girl?”

The house at the base of the lighthouse is small but cozy, with wooden floors and blue accents in an open layout. There are two sparsely furnished bedrooms and a bathroom, and the backyard is like the front—roughed up but lovely, even with the ruined dock extending into the bay. Access to the lighthouse itself is cemented off—but the views from the ground-level windows onto the water are still lovely.

Sarah makes her pancakes for breakfast and lets Savannah pick a bedroom. They unpack her suitcase together, and Savannah puts the photograph of Lachlan and Catherine Weaver under the mattress. She offers to help Sarah unpack her things, curious what would go in her suitcase.

But Sarah says she doesn’t have a suitcase—she’ll go buy some things later—and asks if Savannah has slept enough. Energized by her new home and life, Savannah says yes, and next thing she knows, she’s standing the backyard, holding a handgun and trying desperately not to shake her hands too much.

“It’s not going to bite you,” Sarah says. “I mean, it’s not even loaded yet, but you have to learn how to use this. And that starts with not being scared of it. Okay? A gun is a tool, just like anything else. It can be used for good or bad, and if you don’t learn how to use it for good, someone’s going to use it against you. Now, let’s talk about how you do that.”

The lesson takes up the rest of the morning—Sarah quizzes her on the different parts of the gun and what they do, makes her recite back rules of gun safety and care, and rearranges Savannah’s arms and legs and hands and back and head until her stance and hold are perfect. When Savannah can get that right without help, Sarah carefully loads the gun, talking through each step, and has Savannah fire a shot out into the water. Even with her arms bent, the kickback catches Savannah off-guard, and her shot curves lower than she means it to, bursting through the broken wood on the dock and striking the water with an audible splash.

But, Savannah realizes, she did shoot the gun, and she hit something, and Sarah will show her how to do that better next time. Like when Coach Calhoun had told her she was good at cartwheels—was that really only yesterday?—Savannah feels a rush of pride and wonders if this is what being brave is supposed to be like.

*******

Over a dinner of tuna fish salad, Sarah breaks more bad news: “We have to cut your hair. And dye it.”

Savannah’s had automatically flies to the top of her long ponytail, which still has chalk from the gym yesterday in it. “My hair? Why?”

“It’s beautiful, it’s just…distinct. Really noticeable. We’re going to have to go into town periodically—for groceries and whatever—and I don’t want to leave you alone. And the length—any attacker could just grab your hair and pull.” She tugs the bottom of Savannah’s ponytail to demonstrate. “If it’s short, that’s harder to do. If your hair is darker, people won’t pay as much attention to you as they would to a redhead. And you’d look more like we were related, so no one would question why you’re with me.”

Savannah tries to keep a straight face, but something must show because Sarah adds, “It doesn’t have to be that way forever—just until I know you can make sure it’s not a weakness. And it doesn’t have to be short like a boy’s or anything, just short enough. Like mine. And you can pick the color.”

“Any color?”

“Any color found in nature that isn’t red, anyway. We can go later in the week, maybe—get you some books from the library, too. I can’t really send you to school if you don’t exist on paper, but you should know how to read and write and everything.”

“What does that mean—exist on paper?”

Sarah closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. “Later—well, I want to show you a few punches and things, but I...haven’t really slept in days.” She yawned mightily as if to prove it. “I don’t want—do you think you can stay inside? If I maybe took a nap? Away from the windows and…” She yawned again, and it’s contagious.

“Could I nap with you?” Savannah asks, wondering why Sarah doesn’t seem to notice that’s it’s close to bedtime anyway. “And can you tell me what you mean, that I don’t exist?”

Sarah looks surprised by both questions but nods. “Legally…well, we won’t know for sure for a little bit, but the outside world—including Skynet—is supposed to think you and me are dead. That’s why we need disguises if we go anywhere. But hopefully it’ll stop anyone from coming after us, for a while at least. Mr. Ellison didn’t come with us so he can make sure everyone thinks that. I’m sure you’ll miss him, and I’m sorry you won’t see him or any of your friends at school or anyone again, but…this is how we can keep you safe, okay? I know it kind of sucks.”

“I didn’t really have any,” Savannah blurts out.

“Any what?”

“Friends. At school. I got in trouble because I was talking to John Henry on the computer, and the teacher said he was a bad man who could hurt me. Mommy didn’t think so, but—she was right, wasn’t she? That he was bad? Like…Skynet? He almost broke my wrist once.” She holds up her arm to show Sarah the bruises.

Sarah paused. “I don’t know, Savannah. I don’t know what the machine who was pretending to be your mom wanted to do with him. Sometimes—not very often, but sometimes—there are machines that help us, like Cameron did. But you shouldn’t ever trust a machine, even if they help you. They just do what they’re programmed to. And they can get messed up, like a computer, or get used wrong, like a gun. The last person I met from the future—he told me that sometimes they go bad, the ones that are supposed to be good, and no one knows why.”

“And…the one that was pretending to Mommy went bad? And John Henry? That’s why they left?”

“I guess so. Honestly, I promised you I’d tell you what I could but I just…I don’t know.” She yawns again.

“We can nap now, if you want?” Sarah nods, thankful, and they clean up dinner. After, they curl up together in Sarah’s bed. Savannah hadn’t thought she was tired, not after sleeping in the car, but her eyelids start to droop, and it’s been so long since anyone hugged her.

***

The first time they go into the closest town, a few days later, Sarah fits them both in hats and sunglasses and explains that Saturday mornings are their best bet for not being noticed: no one will wonder why Savannah isn’t in school, and the rush at the supermarket and most other places will be enough for a quiet mother-daughter pair to blend in.

They go to the library first; Savannah quietly browses bookshelves for an hour while Sarah slips away to do grownup things. When she comes back, Savannah has a stack of ten books to check out, and Sarah has a slim brown folder tucked under one arm that turns out to have birth certificates with the new names they picked out the night before. They buy food and general supplies in bulk; Savannah chooses a coal-black hair dye for herself and honey-blonde highlights for Sarah. Next time, they’ll take pictures and get ID cards, so no one can question their new identities.

She thinks of Sophie Jameson as an alter ego, as if she’s a superhero. Sophie has dark hair and loves to read in the library and sneak whipped cream into her mother’s grocery cart. Her father left before she can remember, and her mother Gale works from home. She used to take gymnastics, but she doesn’t know anything about dodging bullets or electrocuting killer robots or how to both hide in and escape from a locked car trunk. Sophie, Savannah thinks, is the girl she was supposed to be.

Savannah Weaver is the girl she is, though. And it turns out that Savannah can do a lot of things better than Sophie, even if her life isn’t quite as simple as the fictional girl’s.

***

Not everything, though. Savannah cries a little when Sarah cuts off her ponytail but is grateful when Sarah doesn’t say anything, just rests a hand on her shoulder for a moment before continuing. It’s the first and last time she cries at the lighthouse.

She has nightmares of Catherine Weaver transforming into storybook monsters, of John Henry detaching from the cord in his head and choking her with it. She rehearses warm-up exercises and recites types of firearms in her head while trying to fall asleep, and that helps. But after the first night that she wakes up screaming, Sarah says she doesn’t sleep much anyway, and she lets Savannah start camping out in the other bedroom sometimes—though not every night, because she’s trying her best to learn to take care of herself, like she’s supposed to.

The only reason she has to be jealous of Sophie Jameson is that Sophie has a proper mother. Sarah doesn’t talk about John very much, but it’s clear she misses him, and Savannah knows better than to try calling her “Mom,” which tastes funny, anyway. But they’re Sarah and Savannah, and even if they’re not really mother and daughter, they’re all each other has now.

And when Judgment Day comes, they’ll be ready.

Still, she feels safer knowing Sarah is always within shouting distance.

***

Before she properly learns anything else, Savannah learns that being Sarah Connor’s ward isn’t going to be easy. She’s not scary the way Mommy had been, but she’s relentless.

They’re up at dawn every day, and she doesn’t leave any time to get bored. Mornings are usually dedicated to running and conditioning, and when Savannah’s little muscles can’t take any more pushups or jogging in the morning, she learns basic math by calculating the supplies needed to sustain however-many people, practices her Spanish accent (Sarah says she should sound more Mexican and less Scottish), and reads whatever books are in the house, mostly history and ancient mythology.

The following weeks and months and eventually years blur together in a mishmash of training. Sarah teaches Savannah how to shoot a gun, throw a punch, and pace herself while running hard and long. She learns how to hide under the floorboards of the kitchen, speak a little Spanish, and where to kick an attacker who’s bigger than she is. Sarah even covers the basics of driving a car, even though Savannah’s feet don’t yet reach the pedals. Driving the motorboat they acquire is easier—she’s tall for her age at four-foot-four-and-a-half and can stand in front of the wheel—and almost as viable, Sarah says, as a mode of escape, if she needs it.

Sarah doesn’t yell. Mostly, she lets the threat of robots taking over the world—or just coming after Savannah—serve as motivation, but it’s clear from her face or her tone of voice when she thinks Savannah isn’t trying hard enough or can be doing better, or more. After a few months, Savannah can’t tell whether Sarah has softened a little or if she’s grown harder, but either way, she learns to shut up, stop whining, and get something done. She’ll never be as strong or fast or skilled as Sarah is—not until this has been her life for a few decades, instead of just a few months—but Sarah doesn’t accept that as an excuse for weakness, so Savannah keeps pushing.

There are days when she runs to the point of nausea, or can barely lift her sore, bruised arms, but Sarah points out that she’s young and growing and her body can adjust to anything—and she’s right. She tells Savannah that her life depends on learning to survive and then makes sure she knows how. Sarah insists she’s capable and powerful, so that’s what she learns to become. She stops hesitating whenever Sarah introduces something new and starts learning how to combine what she knows and react without thinking. When she does stop to think, it’s to repeat her mantra: _be brave, be strong, trust Sarah. A storm is coming._


	2. 2010

**2010**

For her birthday that February, Savannah acquires a small handgun that fits perfectly in her palm, and Sarah shows her how to file off the serial number. They do most of their usual daily routine—a run through the woods that separate them from the rest of the world, stretches and pull-ups and light sparring, math problems over lunch, and a random hour of speaking only in Spanish—but Sarah makes a funfetti cake to go with lunch, and they share an early picnic dinner in the boat out on the water. It’s a warm day for February, and Savannah falls asleep cataloging what ammo from their arsenal stashed under the floorboards in the living room will fit into her very own new firearm.

That weekend, though, they take a detour on the way into town to what turns out to be an animal shelter. Sarah grins as Savannah’s eyes go wide, and they pick out a reddish German Shepherd mix.

She names the dog Ginger. Sarah gives her a funny look and asks if she’s sure, but the name sticks, and she ends up making jokes about her two little redheads in cahoots. Savannah’s hair is currently the same shade of brown as Sarah’s natural color, but she still thinks of herself as a redhead, the same way she still thinks of herself as Savannah Weaver no matter how many times the librarians in town calls her Sophie.

The puppy becomes Savannah’s responsibility—with help from Sarah and library books, she trains it to respond to commands in both English and Spanish. It’s a little hard to make her a real guard dog when no one else ever comes to the lighthouse, but she does her best with training dummies and chew toys. Sarah says the dog will bark up a storm if any metal shows up, though, so Savannah doesn’t worry too much.

***

Savannah herself keeps training, too. Whenever she starts to get good at something, Sarah introduces some new thing to make it harder, like sparring with random props instead of just fists and feet, or tenses in Spanish, or basic algebra once she’s mastered her multiplication tables. (Sarah allows that she hadn’t intended to attempt the last item with a nine-year-old, but Savannah’s surprisingly good at math, and there’s no reason to delay useful education.) At some point, Sarah informs Savannah that she intends to make sure she’s as self-sufficient as can be by her tenth birthday, like they’re on some kind of deadline. Savannah isn’t sure that’s possible, but she knows not to question or doubt Sarah’s commitment to her training.

So, the depth and diversity of what she can do continue to grow. She wires parts of the yard with explosives on her own (albeit under supervision) to stop intruders and memorizes the secret numbers and coded language to reach Mr. Ellison if anything happens to Sarah. She misses Mr. Ellison a little, but she understands why she can only call him if Sarah’s dead—he’s working to stop Skynet on his own, and if anybody finds out they contacted him, they’d know Sarah and Savannah aren’t dead, and then who knows?

By the time summer rolls around, just past a year into her time with Sarah at the lighthouse, Savannah rises with the sun, keeps pace on their morning runs, and can shoot a wobbling aluminum can off the dock on her second try. She’s conversant in Spanish (though her accent still needs work) and can spar hand-to-hand with Sarah for two minutes straight. She doesn’t so much as flinch when Sarah cuts her hair every month or so, and she takes increasing joy in picking out new shades of dye to try whenever her strawberry roots start to peek out.

***

About a month after their one-year anniversary at the lighthouse, Savannah wakes up in the middle of the night with someone’s hands around her throat. She doesn’t think—she’s trained not to—and punches blindly in the dark for where her attacker’s face might be. Her fist hits flesh and produces a grunt, and she launches both feet upward under the blankets to repel whoever is trying to hurt her.

She blinks rapidly, willing her eyes to adjust to the near-total darkness. It can’t be metal—metal is stronger than she will ever be, and wouldn’t grunt, and Ginger would be barking—so she charges at the human silhouette near the door and hits her attacker in the stomach, followed by an upper-cut to the nose. Her hand comes away wet with blood, which has never happened in all her months of training and sparring, and she remembers to scream “Sarah!” at the top of her lungs just before a bare foot connects with her chest.

Where is she? Where is Ginger? Why hasn’t the grass exploded or a gunshot gone off, or—

Savannah falls backwards and watches her attacker advance in the moonlight from the window.

“S—Sarah? What—?”

But Sarah doesn’t respond, just dives at her again. Savannah gives herself a split second to be scared before throwing her legs up to catch Sarah’s neck between her thighs and using Sarah’s momentum to flip her over. The older woman lands on the hardwood floor with a painful, audible thump. Savannah grabs the cord to the metal lamp on her nightstand, yanking it out of the wall. The lamp itself clatters to the floor and breaks next to Sarah’s head, and she whips the cord around Sarah’s neck, whacking her in the eye with the plug in the process and kneeing each of her shoulders down.

For one horrible, endless moment, they both wait there, panting and wordlessly staring at each other. Sarah’s eyes are cold and don’t give away a thing. Savannah knows she probably looks as shocked and baffled as she feels, but even if Sarah is bigger and stronger and knows what on Earth is going on, they both know Savannah could pull the cord tighter if she wanted to.

Then, Sarah’s face breaks into a smile and her entire body relaxes with a chuckle. “I give. Good job, baby girl.”

Savannah doesn’t move.

“Seriously, you can let go. Savannah—”

“You attacked me.”

“And you fought back. Pretty damn well, too.”

“Where’s Ginger?”

“Tied up outside. I wanted to see what you could do on your own.”

She drops the cord and jumps up, backing away. “You wanted to—what, was this like, like a test? Like, you just started hitting me to see what I’d do?”

The blood from Sarah’s nose is starting to dribble onto the floor. “Yup. And you did even better than I’d expected.” She staggers to her feet and tilts her head back holding her nose. “This is gonna be pretty in a few hours. Mind grabbing me a towel or something so I don’t bleed everywhere?”

Savannah walks to the bathroom, feeling strangely removed from her own body all of a sudden, and comes back with a wet washcloth, which she hands over.

“Thanks,” Sarah says, sitting on the bed. “Give me a sec here.” She wipes off her face with one hand and then holds the towel over her nose. “Do you want pancakes? I snuck some whipped cream in with the groceries last week when you went to get those snack packs.”

“Whipped cream?”

“Yeah. You did good. Look, I know—I know that must’ve been scary—”

“I wasn’t scared!”

“Okay, you weren’t scared. But you were ready, and even when you saw it was me, you fought back. You can’t always trust the people you want to, and a lot of them will let you down, or scare you, or hurt you along the way, anyway. And you just showed me that you can take it.”

Savannah blinks. It’s never occurred to her not to trust Sarah, even as she had learned not to trust the thing she had thought was her own mother a year ago, or John Henry. She still feels a little weird, and winded, but Sarah’s right—she could take it. And that seems like as good a reason for midnight pancakes with whipped cream as any.

“Do we have chocolate chips, too?"

***

The months pass without incident. They start buying supplies in bulk—canned goods, ammunition, gasoline, first aid kits, and whatever else might be useful for surviving a robot apocalypse—and stocking up random storage spaces throughout the area. Savannah practices her driving on backcountry roads and learns to read maps as they figure out where to stash everything. Sarah still surprises her with an attack sometimes, or a refusal to speak in English, or some other way to test her, but Savannah knows why she does it. Anyway, after almost a year and a half in each other’s near-constant company, they’re as well attuned to one another’s fighting styles as they are to one another’s favorite foods and mood swings.

For Christmas, they buy two sets of bows, arrows, and arm guards, and they learn archery together. Ginger fetches every arrow that goes wide, which is most of them, but it’s fun having an activity—which eventually does become a skill—that doesn’t have much of anything to do with Skynet.

Savannah reads voraciously, mostly history and science books. She teaches herself how to mix and identify different kinds of explosives and debates how to trick officials at Ellis Island. The librarians sometimes seem skeptical of the books she chooses, but Sarah insists on letting her read anything she wants, and she tries to answer whatever questions Savannah has along the way.

They learn about ant colonies, the Great Chicago Fire, and which tartans go with which Scottish clans. Savannah can spend hours combing the Internet on the library’s computers for whatever answers Sarah doesn’t have, and together they follow news of the companies that could be making Skynet—including Zeira Corp—and try to pinpoint their progress in creating self-aware artificial intelligence.

Sometimes Sarah gives her projects to research at the library while she runs the kind of errands that a preteen sidekick could impede—Savannah doesn’t ask about those—which is how Savannah learns about radiation poisoning and the miles of underground tunnels in and around Los Angeles that will be their home one day. She’s always careful to clear the browser history and avoid any websites that require cookies or logins. If the librarians—the only people she interacts with regularly—think her diverse and occasionally macabre interests are troubling, they chalk it up to Sarah’s hands-off encouragement of Savannah’s self-education (and eccentric hair colors).

There’s no computer in the house, and the TV isn’t hooked up to cable or anything, so they can only watch the occasional rented movie. They end up with an odd assortment of popular comedies and kids’ movies, for what Sarah calls “cultural literacy,” mixed with a wide variety of action movies, which she likes to critique for sloppy fight choreography. Once, a librarian asks her what her favorite films are, and Savannah almost laughs at the confusion on his face when she says, “ _Finding Nemo_ and _Aliens_.”

Once in a while, she talks about books with another kid at the library, but usually she’s busy Googling, and she mostly finds people her age kind of dumb and boring, anyway. They don’t know what’s coming, and they aren’t ready for it. Savannah is old enough now to understand that no one would believe her if she told them, and what little she’s gathered of Sarah’s earlier attempts to do that is warning enough.

From books and what she remembers of her old life, Savannah knows she should probably feel sadder and lonelier than she does. She’s probably supposed to miss her real parents more, too. But she decides not to be sad about being happy and safe, or for not mourning two people she can hardly recall but for the picture shoved under her mattress that she never really looks at. Her mother’s memory is tainted by the machine that had worn her face, and her father—and real mother—are so long-dead that the picture may as well be of strangers.

Savannah’s whole life is Sarah, Ginger, and their little secluded worlds of the lighthouse and the library. She’s safe and wanted, knows all her exits, and she feels strong and brave every day. 


	3. 2011

** 2011 **

When Savannah turns ten, in February, she gets a fishing pole, a bulletproof vest, and permission to dye her hair a color not found in nature, for once. Apparently, she picks the wrong dye, though, because two days later, she ends up soaking in a blue-stained bathtub, wondering why the usual brand they buy would set fine in “Raven” and not “Sapphire.”

She’s been staring at the ceiling for a good forty minutes, with pruned (and bluish) fingers and cold water, when Sarah knocks on the door.

“Everything okay, baby girl? You’ve been in there a while…”

“Everything’s fine!” Savannah says—too quickly, because Sarah walks in.

“…and you’re not usually—oh!” She catches sight of the bathtub and laughs so hard she has to sit down on the toilet to catch her breath. “You poor thing. Oh my God.”

“It’s not funny,” Savannah protests. “But…you’re not mad?”

“Why would I be—I mean, you probably shouldn’t go anywhere until the dye fades at least from your face, but—” Sarah’s attempt at reassurance cuts off when she starts laughing again.

“Well, I just…the—the tub’s blue, and my hair looks like the American flag.” Which is sort of true—she had looked in the mirror about twenty minutes ago, and the blue dye is muddled with the blonde Savannah had previously been sporting beneath it, her naturally red roots are starting to show, and the short cut makes the clash of colors much starker. For some reason this sends Sarah into another spasm of laugher. “You’re not mad about the tub?”

“It’s just a bathtub,” Sarah says, a little breathless, and Savannah can’t quite remember Sarah Connor ever _giggling_. “It’ll wash out eventually. And if it doesn’t…well, Judgment Day will come before I ever sell this place. It was my mom’s cabin, y’know.” She wipes tears of laughter out of the corners of her eyes. “We’ll have to see about your skin, though. At least it’s technically winter—you can wear long sleeves if we really need to go into town. And your librarian friends will think I’ve finally got what’s coming to me after letting you dye your hair so much.” She starts laughing again.

“It’s not funny!”

“Oh, baby girl, it really is. We can get some darker dye, and maybe self-tanner or something if you want. Why would I be mad?”

“It’s just…you always want us to be not that noticeable. And I look like a Smurf! And it was really nice of you to let me try the blue for my birthday, even though I shouldn’t have done that, and it’s not like you _have_ to be taking care of me and keeping me safe in the first place...so. Um.  I thought you would be mad.”

“First of all, I promise, I’m not mad. Second—you know how to keep yourself safe by now, with or without me. And even if you didn’t, of course I’d take care of you.” She pulls the plug, handing Savannah a towel, and the tub looks only marginally less blue as the water drains.

“You would? But I’m not…”

“Not what?”

“Not your kid. I mean, I—I’m really happy here, with you, but I know you miss John and you just got stuck with me because I was on your list and Skynet was—”

“Savannah.” Sarah’s face goes from merry to serious in the space of a syllable. “I do miss John. I will always miss John. But we’re not here because I got stuck with you. I haven’t been taking care of your for almost two years because someone said I had to. Baby girl, you saved my _life_. And the only way you could be more my kid is if I’d actually given birth to you. Okay?”

“Wait, really? But—”

“No buts. Okay? I wouldn’t try to replace your real parents, especially not after—but you’re as good as mine. Really. Remember how I promised I’d always try to tell you the truth?”

“Yes,” Savannah says softly, standing. “I—I always liked when the librarians called you my mom, but I didn’t think you…”

Sarah rises and hugs her so tightly that Savannah’s wet towel soaks through her sweater.

“What did you mean, before, I saved your life?” Savannah asks, voice muffled by Sarah’s shoulder. “I didn’t do anything.”

Sarah rested her cheek on the top of Savannah’s head, which almost reaches her chin now. “After John left, I didn’t…I’m not great on my own. I didn’t know how to stop Skynet like I promised him I’d try to do, and I didn’t…I didn’t really know what I was supposed to do without him. I wasn’t going back to jail. Not with Judgment Day coming. And I couldn’t just…wait. Everything I did from the time I was nineteen—it was all because of him. For him. Who he was supposed to be, saving everybody. And then he was just gone, and…then Ellison asked me what we were supposed to tell you, and do with you. And I realized—I was this mom without a kid, and you were just a kid without a mom, and I thought, maybe we could take care of each other. And then you—you’re all I’ve got, baby girl, and I don’t want you to ever think otherwise.”

The blue in her skin fades after a few days, and a treatment of black dye in a new brand covers all manner of sins, but after that, Savannah feels like something’s changed for good.

***

The last date one of Sarah’s time-travelers had given for Judgment Day is supposed to be two months later, but nothing they’ve learned suggests Skynet is powerful enough to rise yet.

So they spend what’s supposed to be Judgment Day sitting on the remainders of the dock, still unrepaired after all this time, taking turns with the fishing rod and waiting for the bombs to fall. By sunset, they haven’t caught a single fish, and the sky is still clear.

“Do you think you stopped it? Judgment Day?”

Sarah shuddered. “No…I think we just postponed it again, one way or another. Like in ’97—that was the first date I heard. August 29, 1997. Then it was July 25, 2003 or 2004, then 2005, and…guess it’s not going to be April 19, 2011, either.”

“So…are we gonna meet someone else from a different future to tell us when it’s going to happen now?”

“Beats me. I wish I knew. It’s been nice having a couple of years here to just…rest…but I don’t like not knowing what’s coming. Or when. Although even if we did, it could just as easily change again.”

“Maybe John will send someone else like he did before, though?”

“That’s assuming that he went into a future where he can send anybody…or a future that we can survive to experience.”

She understands most of the time travel stuff, as Sarah’s explained it, and can usually keep the verb tenses straight, but the possibility of hopping across a spectrum of possible pasts and futures is still a bit beyond her. “But we have to be ready anyway, right? Because Skynet will happen even if John doesn’t come back, right?”

Sarah stiffens. “It kept happening—or was going to, I mean—no matter what we did before. Don’t know why that would change just because we stopped trying. So yeah, we’ll keep building caches and keeping an eye on things.” The fishing pole jiggles a little, catching both of them off-guard, but a quick check reveals nothing on the hook but the lure. Sarah sighs and stares out at the water. “I do know that we’re pretty bad fisherman, at least, you and me. That’s something to rest easy on.” She smiles wryly.

“Hey, Sarah?”

“Hm?”

“How come it’s always just you and me? I mean, I know we don’t need anyone else or anything, and we have to be careful, but…there were other people on that list right? So, there are maybe other people who know about Skynet and everything. Do you think they’re maybe getting ready, too? Maybe we could all, like, work together. Or would that be too dangerous, like with Mr. Ellison?”

Sarah blinked. “I’ve thought about it, but…it’s a risk. A big one. Not just with having more people here, but if we draw any attention to what we’re doing beyond this house…I just don’t know if it’s the best idea, baby girl.”

“But you think we’re ready for Judgment Day?”

“As much as we can be, short of living closer to, say, a bomb shelter.”

“And that we’ll have to lead people after the bombs stop because no one else will know what’s going on?”

“Yeah—where are you going with this?”

“It’s just—if there were a bunch of other people on the list, how come I’m the only one who’s safe with you?”

“Because you’re my daughter.”

“But that only happened because I needed a mom. And you said it was dangerous and we had to be ready. What if the others need you, too? Even just so they know, like, where the weapons and the food are…”

Sarah cocked her head. “Okay, let’s say we get in touch with a couple other people. Assuming they still believe us, without J-Day today, what would you say happens next?”

She knows it’s a test—liked being attacked in the middle of the night—and tries to figure out how Sarah would do it, making up the answer as she goes along. “I wouldn’t use any computer things to find them, if I could. I guess we’d need Google to search, maybe, but the best way to do it would be in person, where we could just look like anybody else in a crowd and talk to them. Away from, um, CCTV, too, if we could. Or we could call from a pay phone or use the library computers or whatever, if we really needed to, but nothing that anyone could use to find where we live. And then once we recruited them, we’d have to find safe places to meet, and we’d have to pick different times and all, and all get there in different ways, so there’s no regular schedule anyone can track.”

“Good. What do we do with them once we meet?”

“We just…get ready. Like you and me do, only with more people. So we could, I don’t know, teach each other whatever someone doesn’t know, and build more safe houses and stashes, and then instead of just us surviving J-Day because we know where to go and what to do, there’ll be a bunch of us, and when we get out after, the whole group—not just two—will be ready to fight back against Skynet.”

“That’s a pretty big plan, baby girl.”

“I mean—what would you do different?”

“Nope, that’d be the way I’d do it, more or less. I just don’t know if it’s worth the risk—we’re supposed to be dead, we’ve done a lot to stay off everyone’s radar already, and I still get nervous every time we go into one of those harmless, sleepy little towns. Remember that mugger last September?”

Savannah grins. The man had pointed a gun at her head and demanded Sarah’s wallet, right in the middle of the sidewalk, but it had been obvious to both of them the weapon was unloaded and still had the safety on, no less. Savannah had elbowed him in the groin, hard, and stomped on his foot, then ducked out of the way for Sarah to grab his gun and knock him out with it. They had bolted with the empty gun before any bystanders could get a better look or the police arrived. Sarah had insisted they switch up towns and grocery stores more often, and it was months before they’d returned to the same ZIP code without driving in circles first.

“It’s not like he knew who we are! And anyway, wouldn’t more of us be better for when it’s J-Day, whenever that is? Besides, what if someone else on the list is, like, a kid without parents because of Skynet?”

“I’ll think about it,” Sarah allows.

***

They continue with their usual routines and preparations and monitoring. Savannah asks about the theoretical others periodically and gets the same non-answer every time: “I haven’t decided yet.”

Meanwhile, her hair grows out in its natural red for the first time in over two years—Sarah agrees she looks, moves, and acts different enough from her eight-year-old self that anyone who’d known her would be hard-pressed to recognize her. Sarah herself keeps the same blonde highlights—she’d never been interested in the veritable rainbow Savannah had experimented with—and they both maintain matching chopped-short hairstyles that leave little room for fuss.

She’s ten and a half now, and she figures that means she should have a little more autonomy—especially if she’s supposed to be a future leader of the human resistance. Sarah had told her about the couple of times she had let machines help her—“let” was key here, you could never “trust”—and Savannah hadn’t missed the part where Sarah had swayed because her then-ten-year-old son thought fighting metal with metal was a good idea. The point is, Sarah’s word doesn’t have to be absolute, even if she’s usually right and knows almost everything.

It’s not that Savannah has any interest in a pet robot. Memories of “Cold Mommy” still give her the occasional nightmare if she hasn’t slept enough. While most of her recollections of John Henry are good ones, they’re colored by Sarah’s warning about metal going bad sometimes—especially the time when he’d hurt her. And, together, he and the shapeshifter had both left her, properly orphaned at barely eight years old, and alone but for Sarah.

But she does want to sway Sarah, so she starts planning. She pays closer attention to movies where the women fighting have long hair, even if they’re not that realistic, and she hides treats in her pockets and wrestles with Ginger. She starts experimenting a little when sparring with Sarah, too. Mostly, she ends up with new bruises, but she gradually finds a couple of Sarah’s physical weakness—a badly-healed bullet wound on her thigh, a bum ankle, a scrambled nerve cluster near her hip—to use to her advantage.

Sarah notices that their sparring has evolved as soon as Savannah works up the nerve to start aiming for her face and neck and forcing herself to go for longer even when she’s knocked down. She doesn’t actually say as much to Savannah, but their morning runs lengthen or sometimes switch to sprints, and she introduces props into their sparring, like unloaded guns, knives padded with dishtowels, and just about anything heavy enough to give a grown man pause.

One wet and unseasonably warm morning in early October, Sarah goes for a quick swim, and Savannah ties a short rope of t-shirts around her head. When Sarah returns, Savannah pounces, and wrestles her to the floor, using her makeshift ponytail alternatively like a whip and a garrote. She uses her lower body to pin Sarah’s down and presses the rope down on her throat until Sarah says, “Give.”

Savannah grins and rocks back on her heels to standing. Sarah coughs a couple of times and rubs her throat but she’s grinning. She props herself up on her elbows. “You’ve been practicing for something. Why?”

“I want to grow my hair out. You said I could when I could prove it wouldn’t be dangerous. And if it gets long enough, I can even use it like that. I’m right, right?”

Sarah laughed. “Don’t let me regret saying yes, baby girl.”

Savannah’s hair falls to her shoulder blades by the time her birthday rolls around again, and, whatever else happens in her day, no one touches her thick braid, not even Sarah.


	4. 2012

** 2012 **

Savannah turns eleven on a sunny Saturday, although the day doesn’t quite start that way: Sarah wakes her up a good hour before dawn with a gentle shake and a loud whisper of “Surprise!” Savannah naps in the passenger seat while they clear town and get to backcountry roads; Sarah has her drive for a while from there, in part so Savannah can practice where no one will notice and in part so she can nap herself. Ginger spends the whole ride in the back, alternately sleeping and staring out the windows with tail-wagging excitement.

They stop for gas and Snickers bars a couple hours after sunrise, and by midmorning Sarah steers them into an unremarkable neighborhood in suburban Los Angeles, with cul-de-sacs of matching houses and yards littered with toys and the occasional leftover Christmas decoration. They pull up across the street from a house that looks mostly like the others, except it’s maybe a little smaller.

Sarah puts the car in park and turns to look at Savannah.

“Baby girl, did you ever wonder about how we’ve subsisted for so long, just the two of us alone at the lighthouse all the time?”

“I…yeah, but you said you bribed some city planner to take our little spit of land off the map after your mom got killed, so nobody would think to look for the lighthouse or us or anything.”

“Well, yeah, but I meant…I’ve never had a job, as long as you’ve known me. So…”

It hasn’t occurred to Savannah to ask about this, and it must show on her face, because Sarah continues, “When your parents died, they left everything they had to you, but after the metal took over Catherine Weaver’s life, it—she—changed their will so that if something happened to her _and_ to you, that everything would go to Mr. Ellison.”

“Mr. Ellison—so, he got everything after we left and faked our deaths?”

“Yeah, but—he’s a good man, you know, and _that_ afternoon, when everything changed? We agreed that we had to keep you safe, and so he set up a bank account for us—well, me—to use. So, your, I guess, trust fund has paid for everything over the last few years—food and clothes and gas for the car and everything else we’ve needed. Plus, everything in our caches. That’s all because of you, in a way. Is…that okay?”

“I mean, I guess so, yeah. Why wouldn’t it be? It’s not like you could’ve gotten a job and still trained me all the time, right? But why are you telling me this now?”

“Because it’s time to say thank you.”

“To who?” Savannah asks, though she can guess.

“Go knock on the door.”

Savannah can guess. She gets out of the car and honestly can’t remember the last time she was in a regular, boring neighborhood like this. It occurs to her that she doesn’t know how to ride a bike, and that most eleven-year-olds who do probably haven’t also got a loaded handgun in reach at all times. She puts the thoughts aside as she walks up the sidewalk to the front door and knocks. Sarah hovers quietly behind her.

The door creeks as it opens, and Savannah’s hand automatically flies to the waist of her jeans, where her gun is tucked. She forces herself to relax, and a moment later she’s looking into the eyes of the only father figure she has any real memory of.

Mr. Ellison gasps openly at the sight of her. She glances at Sarah for about half a second, just in case there’s something else going on, but Sarah just smiles and jerks her head back at Mr. Ellison.

“What—what are you two doing here?”

“Can we come inside? It’s secure?” Sarah asks, calm but for an often-present hint of urgency.

“Of course, yeah…”

Mr. Ellison’s house is sparsely decorated but comfortable, and they follow him to the living room, where he clears binders and stacks of paper out of the way for them to sit on the overstuffed sofa. He wavers for a moment, clearly unused to playing host, before sitting in a wooden chair across from them.

There’s a long, pregnant silence, and the two adults appear to be in a staring contest, so Savannah interjects, “It’s my birthday.”

Mr. Ellison blinks. “You’re—what, ten now?”

“Eleven.”

“What do you and Sarah usually do for…”

“You know what,” Sarah interrupts. “I’m going to go make some coffee, if you don’t mind, James. We got on the road at six.”

He nods, and as soon as Sarah appears to be out of earshot, leans in toward Savannah and asks, “Is she taking care of you? Everything’s been okay? You’re not…”

Savannah nods vigorously. Her life may not be normal, but it’s hers. And it’s much better than growing up among Mexican drug lords and Nicaraguan revolutionaries, like John did—she can’t imagine those lives beyond Sarah’s occasional stories, but she knows enough to be grateful for a stationary home and the ability to sleep soundly in it.

“She takes really good care of me—and she made sure I knew how to take care of myself if she got, like, arrested, too.”

“What would you do?”

“Find a police station—I know how to drive—and tell them somebody had kidnapped me for a while and that you were supposed to be my legal guardian. She said I could do that if I ever wanted to leave her, too, but it’s not like I’d want to do that. She’s—well, she’s my mom, you know? Now. Oh, and she said to say thank you. For taking care of us.”

He frowned. “It’s…it’s your money, really; I just set up the account. So she’s—you’re happy, then? No Terminators or anything?”

Savannah shook her head. “Nobody knows we’re there.”

“She’s safe, she’s happy, and thank you, again, for faking our deaths,” Sarah said, returning from the kitchen with three mugs neatly balanced in her hands. “Coffee for you, tea for her, coffee for me…”

“Why are you here?” Mr. Ellison interrupts. “It’s been three years since—Savannah, could you actually…?”

“Whatever you have to say to me, you can say to both of us. She knows as much about what’s happening as I do, and she needs to be prepared if anything happens to me. Or you, for that matter.”

Mr. Ellison clearly isn’t happy about that, but he must realize she’s right, because he continues. “It’s been three years since you convinced me Savannah’s best hope for safety—for survival—was with you, and there wasn’t room for any contact with me. She’s had other birthdays for you to change the rules here. Why today?”

“Because she had a good idea. And we need your help.”

“I did?” Savannah asks at the same time Mr. Ellison says, “You do?”

“Judgment Day didn’t happen last spring like it should’ve, based on the last information I had from John’s soldiers. I don’t for a second believe we stopped it, but something’s different. And then Savannah suggested we start recruiting.

“There are at least a few others who know what we do, who believe. And we might as well be working together, if they’re people we can trust. The more of us who are ready when the bombs fall, the better off we’ll be when we start to fight back. I have one contact that’s been following a couple of leads for me, and we’re going to check out another later today. And we’re here to see you because if there’s anyone at Zeira who should be on the list, I want you to send them to us.”

He doesn’t even blink. “How? And who’s your contact?” When Sarah hesitates, he adds, “This place isn’t bugged. I do regular sweeps myself, and Murch set up a whole white noise disruption thing anyway.”

“The newest librarian at the Carpinteria Branch Library. That’s your answer to both questions. Ask for Mrs. Carter, and she’ll make the connection. And, for what it’s worth, we’re not actually in Carpinteria.”

Savannah stares at Sarah with a funny feeling in her stomach. She knows who Mrs. Carter is—an Asian-Australian librarian who had never commented on her wide-ranging interests and occasional bruises—but it had never crossed her mind that she would be other than what she seemed. Mrs. Carter probably isn’t even her real name, Savannah realizes.

Mr. Ellison just nods. “I’ve got a couple in mind, but I’m guessing I should wait a few months just to play it safe?”

***

Savannah is silent for the first chunk of the drive to San Diego, where their possible contact is. They loop through state parks and back roads as usual, which makes the trip longer, and by the time they pass the Lake Henshaw area, Sarah says, “Okay, baby girl, what’s eating you? I thought you’d be happy to see him—that was why I waited until today.”

“I was.”

“But?”

“You didn’t tell me you thought I was right. About finding other people. And you didn’t tell me about Mrs. Carter. Who is she, really?”

“I wanted to surprise you. For your birthday.” Sarah blows a raspberry, and a lock of hair flutters out of her face. “And Mrs. Carter—she’s a soldier from the future. I don’t like her, I don’t trust her, and I don’t want her anywhere near you. And she knows it. And honest introductions in a public place seemed like a bad idea.”

“You could’ve told me at home. She’s been working there for months—since, like, last summer at least—and I can keep my mouth shut. You know that. I wouldn’t have messed anything up.”

“I told you, I don’t want her near you anyway. And telling you wouldn’t have changed anything any of us was doing.”

“Then why are you even working with her?”

“Because she knows what’s coming, and you were right that we need more allies. I don’t trust her for a second one-on-one, but she’ll do what needs doing for the greater good. And unlike you and me, she already has an established identity, so she can look into a couple of Army guys without raising any flags.”

“Who are we going to see now?”

“Someone else on the list. A girl—well, woman, by now, and her sister. Skynet killed their mom, too.”

“Do they go by fake names, too?” At Sarah’s sharp look, she added, “Well, obviously Mrs. Carter isn’t her name.”

“Her real name is Jesse. Jesse Flores. The girls are Lauren and Sydney Fields, but they’re hiding as the Kelleys—a single mom and daughter. And if I ever hear you use any of their real names outside of—”

“You know I won’t.”

“And you know part of the deal is that I need you to trust me.”

The rest of the ride is silent.

***

It’s early evening by the time they pull into the Rady Children's Hospital parking lot. Savannah follows Sarah without protest to the waiting room near the ER, and they sit wordlessly for nearly an hour. Sarah flips through magazines; Savannah mentally rehearses judo combinations and does pushups in between trips to the vending machines. The place is busy enough that the hospital staff leaves them alone, and it isn’t until the nurses have a clear shift change—a group of mostly women in scrubs walk toward the main exit—that Sarah elbows her gently and moves to follow them.

A woman maybe fifteen years Sarah’s junior spots them and splits off from her friends with a practiced casualness. She glances at Savannah before turning to Sarah and asking in a low voice, “How did you get here?”

“Car,” Sarah says, equally quiet and, to any onlookers, calm. “It’ll be quiet. And we can pick her up from wherever she is, if you want.”

“Perfect.”

No one talks again until they’re in the car and winding through a quiet neighborhood to confirm that nobody’s tailing them. For all the maneuvering she and Sarah do on a weekly basis, Savannah has never felt so much like she’s in a spy movie.

The woman—Lauren or Sydney or Mrs. Kelley or whatever—speaks first. “How did you find me?”

“A thought experiment and a lot of luck. It wouldn’t have worked if I didn’t know what you looked like. I figured—Sydney’s blood is meant to cure a disease in the future, right? So what does a twenty-something girl on her own do with a baby do to be ready and stay under the radar? Nursing school is much quicker than an M.D., and you get more clinical experience faster. Emergency medicine is going to be way more useful than anything else after Skynet rises, anyway.

“Plus, you could make friends with the lab techs, learn everything you could about her blood, just in case. I sent a woman—another soldier from the future—to a few different hospitals in southern California to check out the nursing staff. She brought me pictures, and I recognized you. Although she doesn’t know anything except that I was trying to find a nurse.”

Savannah twists around to watch the nurse in the backseat. She’s fiddling with a charm around her neck and spends several seconds processing before finally replying, “Well, you nailed it. Even keep her blood and the test results on me, just in case. But why are you here? Why now?” She lets the charm go, and Savannah realizes it’s a dark red vial.

“We—Savannah and I—we’re recruiting. Her name was on the same list as your family’s, and she’s as good a future soldier as anyone.” In spite of the day’s twists, Savannah brightens a little at the compliment. Sarah isn’t mean or especially withholding, but she doesn’t give out praise easily or undeservedly, either.

“We don’t know when Judgment Day is, but we’re going to be ready. And you already believe. Plus, I’ve been where you are—single parenting is probably the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Which is saying something. So I thought maybe reinforcements would help some. We’re holed up in a little house up the coast that doesn’t appear on any maps—believe me, I paid off the right people before you were born—and there’s room for a couple more. Nurses are always in demand, so you could probably transfer somewhere up there if you wanted to keep working. And Lauren—Sydney would be well protected whenever you were gone. We can protect her better than some daycare could.”

Lauren’s hand goes to her necklace again. “What happened to the other girl who was with you? And the guy—when my mom died, he—”

Sarah shook her head. “Gone. Both of them. He’s dead. And Cameron—she was metal—got knocked out of commission. Savannah helped me destroy her chassis years ago.” This isn’t strictly true—Savannah had stood wide-eyed while Sarah and Mr. Ellison had burned it before they even left that basement—but the probably inconsequential lie makes her sound like she was especially capable at age eight, so she doesn’t correct Sarah.

“…It’d just be the four of us,” Sarah finishes.

“Who else are you recruiting?”

“A military guy who already knows what’s coming—he was on the list, too. Whoever else he can recruit. Savannah’s former guardian—he runs a computer company, and he’ll pass along anyone who he’s sure of. Anyone else my contact—another soldier from the future—can ferret out. I wasn’t going to offer anyone else a place to live, though.”

Lauren squeezes the vial and lets it go like she’s willing herself to relax. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay. We’ll come. But we need to pack up the apartment—there’s not much there, but—and my security deposit—”

“Don’t worry about money,” Savannah pipes up. Sarah has some explaining to do, but that’s not Lauren’s fault, and at the end of the day, Sarah thought her ideas were sound. “We’ve been living off my trust fund. Sort of. It’s big.”

Lauren’s eyes grow round, but she nods without hesitation. “Give me two weeks and a place to meet you.”

***

The Fields sisters arrive at the designated meeting spot—a high-traffic corner on the UCSB campus—exactly fourteen days later in a battered SUV that Lauren obliquely claims to have received as a gift on their way out of town. Sydney is tiny and silent, with a piercing stare and a heavy thumb-sucking habit. She’s clearly no budding warrior, but she’s just as clearly used to clandestine moves and behaving to a fault around strangers, so she nods and solemnly shakes Sarah’s and Savannah’s hands without a word before climbing back into the SUV. They caravan back to the lighthouse, weaving through the woods and along the shoreline.

It’s been a quiet couple of weeks at home. Savannah isn’t quite ready to forgive Sarah’s keeping her in the dark, and Sarah has chosen to wait out her anger rather than provoke another argument. Anyway, getting ready for two additional occupants has taken up more than enough time—doubling supplies, deciding on sleeping arrangements (Sarah moves into Savannah’s room, and Savannah doesn’t protest the superficial things), determining routes for Lauren to commute to her new job, and so on.

But on the drive back, Sarah finally says, “I should have told you about Jesse. Mrs. Carter. And finding the others. I haven’t heard from anyone since your birthday, but next time I do…you’re right, you should be there.”

Sarah doesn’t often admit to being wrong—not about the big stuff, anyway—so Savannah tries to react like the adult she’s trying to be, not a little kid who doesn’t deserve to be part of saving the world. “It’s just—it was my idea. And, if—if anything happened to you, and I couldn’t get to Mr. Ellison, or I wanted to keep helping instead of just pretending that I’d been kidnapped or whatever…I can’t, like, be this prepared solider like I’m supposed to be if I don’t have all the facts, you know?”

“I know. I just—you’re all I’ve got, baby girl, and I want you safe for as long as I can make that happen. And I wanted to make sure you knew that before Lauren and Sydney came home. She—Lauren, I mean—and I, we’ve got some planning to do, I think. Big picture stuff. And you’re going to be a part of that. But it’s all or nothing, you know; if you want to be treated like a grown-up…”

“I have to act like it. I know. Can I ask a question?”

“Shoot. And—slug bug.” Sarah lightly punches her bicep.

“Why do you trust her? A few weeks ago you said she was the only one you’d ask to come live at the lighthouse.”

“I trust her…” Sarah sighs and gazes briefly through the rear window at the car behind them. “I trust her because she reminds me of me. Some stranger told her that Skynet would raise hell on Earth in a few years and that the human race needed her unborn sister to survive. Most people would’ve walked away, or just bided their time, or hoped it wasn’t true. But she did what I did—maybe not as extreme, but she did what she had to. Got them hidden, under fake names and everything. Got the training she needed to make sure they were both ready and that Sydney could survive and be who she needs to be. Lauren wasn’t anyone’s target, but she dropped everything— _changed_ everything—to save the person that was. That’s what I did for John, once, and that’s what I would do again for you, if I needed to. Good reason?”

“Yeah, good reason. And Sarah?”

“Hm?”

“Thanks. For—”

Sarah dismisses her with a hand wave. “This is what we do, baby girl. This is what our life is. I wouldn’t change—well. You ready to be part of a family? Kind of?”

Savannah grins and squeezes her hand over the stick shift. “Let’s do it.”

***

The Fields sisters fall into life at the lighthouse easily enough. Lauren works at a hospital under her fake name and keeps an eye out for strange injuries in the ER. She doesn’t love firearms—not like Sarah does, or like Savannah has come to—but she has a healthy respect their necessity. Plus, she has quick reflexes, a mean poker face, and a knack for cooking well beyond Sarah’s pancakes and tuna salad, so Savannah quickly likes the older girl. She has a happier demeanor than Sarah, too—her attitude is more, _yes, the world’s going to end soon, but look how pretty the sunset is!_ —that Sarah attributes to her raising a little kid.

Sydney is all but a ghost when her sister isn’t around—the girl shies away from their arsenal and only seems to grasp what Sarah tries to teach her about hiding in place. When Lauren’s around, she brightens up and will talk a little, but Sarah seems to scare her, even when she’s trying to be nice. (Ginger scares her, too, but learning the dog’s commands goes a long way toward fixing that.) Lauren agrees to let them show her how to use the smallest gun they have—if they can convince her to watch in the first place—but she cries every time Savannah closes her little hand around the grip.

It’s the first time Savannah realizes that not just any orphaned little girl could have become Sarah Connor’s daughter.

Lauren and Sydney keep to themselves in many ways—Savannah figures it’s just what they’re used to, and it gives her time alone with Sarah, who, with some prompting, has started to chart out her complicated understanding of the future. In the process, some of her past starts to emerge.

Savannah comes to learn that she’s eight years younger than she should be, and that she worried about Cameron’s allegiances and goals, and that she doesn’t seem to have much to say about John’s unnamed father and uncle. (She knows the former died before John was born, and the details of the latter’s death in her parents’ living room are fading, but the memory is still so unnerving that she tries not to think about it too much.) Sarah hardly talks about John directly, only in the context of trying to fathom his pet metal and what future-him was supposed to be like and do. Savannah supposes she misses him more than she lets on, but Sarah’s feelings about her two children isn’t a book Savannah quite wants to open, so she doesn’t think about that much, either. They’re each other’s family now; the past can only matter so much.

Lauren drops in on these conversations sometimes, and when they run well past Sydney’s bedtime, Savannah feels like one of the grown-ups. It’s neither a good or bad feeling, really, just a point of fact—that she’s not like Sydney, small and scared—and the strength she feels brewing just under her skin is enough to remind her that, whatever her role in the future is, it’s going to be more than blood donation.

***

At the end of the summer, a year after Savannah’s initial suggestion, Lauren takes her and Sydney to the library while Sarah is supposed to be napping off a summer cold, at their resident nurse’s insistence. The sisters are browsing the children’s section while Savannah flips through a book of diagrams of da Vinci machines. She’s trying to figure out which of the models might be useful—and able to be made—after Judgment Day, but she’s not so engrossed that she almost fails to notice a woman approach her from behind.

It’s Mrs. Carter—Jesse Flores—whom Sarah still doesn’t mention without glaring. Savannah makes a mental note to ask why she doesn’t trust the other woman, but it’s the first time she’s seen Jesse since before her birthday, and she’s probably about to be attacked or used as a messenger, and either way, she wants to be prepared to deal with those more immediate facts.

Savannah waits for her to make the first move, and Jesse settles on the bench next to her and brusquely checks the cover of the book Savannah’s holding. “Finding everything you need, Sophie?”

“Yes. I think I’m going to check this book out.”

“I had another one you might like, but it’s not in the shop right now. Interested?”

Talking in code—however thinly-veiled—is new to Savannah, but it’s not that hard. Most adults assume that, as an eleven-year-old, she’s dumber than she is. “Yes. Could you write down the title for me?”

Jesse shakes her head. “If I tell you, will you remember?”

Savannah nods, and listens carefully. “Noon Picnic at Summers Park. Comes out September 12. Want me to put you on the list?”

“That’s a funny name for a book…who’s the author?”

“He’s called Martin. Your mom should know of him.”

“I guess you haven’t seen her in a while?” They haven’t been back to Carpinteria at all since Sarah had admitted Mrs. Carter’s true identity at Mr. Ellison’s house, actually.

“No, not since she asked me to look into a few titles last winter. Will you tell her? That’s the only one I know right now, okay?”

***

Savannah prides herself on not tipping off Lauren and Sydney about the encounter. When they’re home, she leaves them unpacking the bag of checked-out books and, to her surprise, finds Sarah actually asleep in their room. She’s on the verge of leaving to let that rare occurrence continue, but Sarah snaps awake at the mere hint of another person in the room and sits up with a start.

“Everything okay?”

“Yeah, we’re just back from the library. In Carpinteria. Um—Jesse Flores, she gave me a message for you. Picnic at Summers Park, September 12. Noon. Someone named Martin—she said you’d know him? I’m assuming that’s like a meet-up…do you know who Martin is?”

“If he’s who she was supposed to find, he’s supposed to be a big tactical guy in the future. Martin Bedell. Right now, he’s an officer in the Army somewhere, but John kept him safe firsthand when his name came up on the list, so he’s a believer.”

“If he’s a believer, how come we didn’t just go see him like with Lauren?”

“He’s military—I don’t know where he lives, but it’s probably on a base, and even if it’s not, there’s no way it’s worth the risk for us to find him directly. So I asked Jesse to track him down—I’m willing to risk _her_ , and she’s not presumed dead at the moment or wanted for anything.”

“Unlike some of us?”

“Yeah…anyway, she was supposed to tell him to start doing some recruiting of his own. Any guesses why?”

“Well, military people…they’d already know how to handle weapons and things. Or making bombs or EMPs or whatever. And they’d have their own stuff, too.”

“Good.”

“They’d be trained in other things, probably—like if someone’s in intelligence, they might know about when Skynet’s going to happen. Or, like, an engineer could be good if we’re living in tunnels. Or more medics like Lauren.”

“Better. Give me one more. One Skynet won’t care about, but we should.”

“They’re…they’re part of an establishment thing. So when we’re trying to organize people after J-Day, people will see these big soldiers and realize that we’re right and believe us and listen to us.”

Sarah grins and motions her over for a hug. “Good girl. I guess we’ve got a picnic to get ready for. And a Summers Park to find.”

***

September 12, 2012 is a Wednesday, so the park is empty but for a couple of parents and very small children. Sydney is a perfect decoy—she brightens up in the midday sunlight and even plays fetch with an obliging Ginger. Their story is simple, though well-rehearsed—Sarah and Lauren are a couple with a younger daughter who decided to pull the older one out of school to enjoy such a lovely day. No one asks, though, and by noon, they’re the only people in the park. Sarah is even stretched out on the picnic blanket, surrounded by snack wrappers and looking for the entire world like a woman at ease.

At a quarter-past, a beat-up silver sedan appears in the parking lot, and six people climb out. The four men have matching crew cuts, and two of them are wearing fatigues. One of the women has her blonde hair pulled back in a tight bun, and all of them are well-muscled and serious-faced.

Lauren notices them, too, and nudges Sarah, who shrugs and digs another cookie out of the nearest box.

The man at the front of the pack—slim but powerful-looking, with fair skin and sharp eyes—approaches them, while the others settle at a picnic table. “I’m Marty; I don’t think we’ve met yet. Ms. Flores said I’d find you here. The shibboleth’s ‘Come with me,’ she said to tell you.”

“‘If you want to live,’” Sarah rejoins. “Nice to finally meet you, Marty Bedell.”

They shift to the picnic tables, and Lauren tasks Sydney with keeping lookout.

“Right,” says Marty. “You know me. That’s my wife Alyssa, her friend Rose Reynolds with the bun, and the other guys are Ray Rodriguez, Jorge Cortes, and Owen Jones. Are we doing last names, or…?”

Sarah shrugged. “Lauren Fields and her little sister Sydney. My daughter, Savannah Weaver. And I’m Sarah Connor, but I’m guessing if you’re here, you know that I’m probably not what you thought.”

They meet for over an hour—risky if anyone is watching, but no one seems to be. Marty and the others run through their various backgrounds and abilities: Rose is a civil engineer, Ray is in command with Marty, Jorge does some kind of intelligence work, and Owen and Alyssa are both civilians but work on the base—he does IT and she does catering.

All of them talk about the future frankly and practically, like Judgment Day is a series of events to be organized for and dealt with, which to Savannah seems in marked contrast to Sarah’s tightly-wound emotions regarding the fall of humanity. They all seem vaguely in awe of her, though it’s under a veil of professionalism and discipline that seems almost stereotypical for a bunch of soldiers.

Sarah unrolls maps of southern California and they begin to plot out locations for additional caches and makeshift bunkers for when the bombs fall. There’s too much planning to cover in one afternoon, but at the very least, everyone can start scouting out specifics and gathering preliminary supplies, like weapons and canned food. Savannah gives everyone a list she’s prepared of what they’re responsible for and where to put it. No one questions the presence of an eleven-year-old—they mostly ignore here and don’t really include her in the conversation, but they don’t suggest she go play with Sydney and the dog, either.

They set another meeting—at the Bedells’ house, which is closer to but not on the base, so there’s no need for more than a couple people to arrive in one car, and indoors, making surveillance harder. (Sarah informs them she’ll be doing her own checks anyway; Savannah knows about the tracker she thought was a tumor and doesn’t blame her.) In the meantime, everyone will stay vigilant and more than a little suspicious.

On the way home—a good half-hour after the others leave, and with a check for trackers on the car—Sydney whispers to Lauren in the back seat, and Lauren voices a question that Savannah realizes she should’ve asked.

“Why do we just trust these folks on their say-so? What’s keeping them from going back to base and telling someone they met the infamous Sarah Connor today?”

Sarah, who looks a little sunburnt and more than a little tired, blows a raspberry, making her bangs flutter. The effect is basically the opposite of infamy. “For one thing, they’d have a hell of a time getting anyone to believe them. They don’t know where we live, nor do they have any contact info besides the librarian. And I’m a middle-aged brunette. Not exactly distinct-looking, especially for a bunch of people who have no reason to have more than a passing knowledge of me, at best.

“In any case, we’re trusting them because we have a war to fight, and the four of us can’t do it alone. We’re going to be at Ground Zero after J-Day, and if we don’t get all these things in place, there’re hundreds of people—maybe more—that we’ll lose. When I met that first time-traveler in ’84, he told me Skynet would become self-aware in 1997. Then it was 2003, then 2011. We stopped those…or someone did, anyway. But as far as I’m concerned, we’ve been living on borrowed time ever since.

“Bedell’s seen what we’ve seen—machines made to kill and borderline impossible to stop—and he’s managed to move up to a place where his unit’s all but ready to react to Judgment Day even if they don’t know it. And that’s before we came into the picture. He’s one of us, and he’s convinced the others. I can see it. I don’t intend to be reckless with our safety, but there are hundreds—maybe thousands—of lives at stake. We might be able to save them, but four people with an encrypted bank account trying to stay under the radar are only going to get so far.

“Good enough for you guys?”

It makes sense to Savannah, and Lauren nods and adds, “Do they know about John? He didn’t come up at all, and I know you said…”

Sarah stiffens, and her knuckles turn white on the steering wheel. “Bedell would know. I don’t know what he told the others already. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t talk about him in front of any other new people who show up.”

“Why?”

Sarah doesn’t respond, and the question hangs in the air. The obvious answer is that it’s painful to talk about her lost sixteen-year-old, regardless of anything else, but anyone who knows Sarah knows she’ll deal with pain if it advances the cause.

But not for nothing has Savannah spent every day with Sarah for the last three and a half years. She’s beginning to realize that she doesn’t know everything about her adoptive mother, not nearly, but she knows a fair amount, and the answer comes to her.

“Because we can’t afford to wait for a savior, and nobody should think that one’s coming. We have to take care of ourselves.”

The corners of Sarah’s mouth twitch—a not-smile that suggests she’s pleased with Savannah if unhappy about the context. It occurs to her that they wouldn’t be here—not her with Sarah, let alone the Fields sisters or the rest—if John hadn’t left. She knows Sarah Connor would do anything for her children, but it’s hard to fathom what would happen if they were side by side. She wonders if he would have wanted to recruit like this, or if he’d even trust Lauren. Then she thinks, _but he left_ , and settles back into her seat for the rest of the drive.

***

Throughout the fall into the winter, they continue their lengthy and irregular planning meetings. Owen offers a communications code that machines will find harder to crack. Savannah does endless calculations around canned foods and vitamin packs while Alyssa and Rose figure out how to turn the results into secure stashes that can feed a starving army—or try, at least. They have no way to know how many people will survive the initial slaughter, nor how many more will die in the following weeks—from radiation poisoning, starvation, another person’s hand—or even by choice. Still, Lauren and Helena, a medic that Ray recruited, collect bandages and iodine tablets and whatever else they can smuggle from work or buy or steal wholesale.

They have a proper Christmas for the first time since Savannah can remember—the metal impersonating her mother had neglected to celebrate it—complete with a real tree and presents. She was disabused of any belief in Santa Clause that cold winter (though Mr. Ellison had brought her a doll), but Lauren recruits her to keep Sydney believing for another year. In return, Lauren helps her track down a gift for Sarah—a special-edition DVD of _The Wizard of Oz_ —and hide it from her.

They do spend a chunk of Christmas Eve and all of New Year’s stocking up the storage lockers and various other bunkers and caches, admittedly—it’s a prime opportunity to go unnoticed—but all four of them seem to be better for being a little less isolated.


	5. 2013

** 2013 **

Savannah turns twelve in February, though it feels like much more time has passed since her last birthday. It’s not worth the risk to contact Mr. Ellison again, especially with the potential for someone to spot the pattern, but the military folks do show up to help throw her a surprise party—which nearly goes south when she notices movement in what’s supposed to be an empty house and sucker-punches an unsuspecting Alyssa.

Sarah is on edge for weeks afterward, wondering silently if cops will suddenly show up at the lighthouse, and she hides it poorly, but nothing happens, and at some point, having various extra people around the house at odd times becomes normal.

Through Jesse, Mr. Ellison connects them with a young married couple who have a baby and higher government security clearances than even Marty or Jorge. No one has evidence of Skynet’s imminent rise, but the extent to which the military relies on artificial intelligence puts everybody on edge. So they keep preparing in the only ways they know how—more caches with better stocks, more training, more recruiting, more research on surviving an apocalypse. Their little army grows to twenty—plus a few more contacts who aren’t privy to where the lighthouse is—and hardly a week goes by without at least a couple of people stopping by  for a few hours or days to pass on information or drop off supplies to be stored until they’re sorted into one bunker or another.

Having so many other people around who know what’s going on takes getting used to. Savannah’s not used to talking openly about anything with anyone but Sarah—even the Fields sisters don’t know she spent so much time in the care of a murderous hunk of shapeshifting metal—but she makes herself share the less personal facts that need sharing, like her methodology for counting canned vegetables into a given bunker or how a twelve-year-old can knock out a grown man.

She’s been with Sarah long enough that no one questions their relationship, even if it isn’t biological. They don’t look alike at all, so most people guess that part, but social niceties count for enough that no one asks about her old life or her birth parents, which is a relief. The picture of the Weavers stays hidden under her mattress, and most days, she simply forgets that it’s there.

***

In the middle of July, one night after dinner, Sarah takes her to a meeting at a closed but unmonitored community pool with an older middle-aged woman and her adult son. Savannah spends most of the car ride there trying to remember why the names Tarissa and Danny Dyson sounds familiar, but they reach the meeting place before she gives up and asks.

Tarissa looks at Sarah with a strange mix of contempt and trust but listens carefully and asks the right questions as Sarah points to safe houses on a map and explains their best chances of surviving Judgment Day. She declines any further involvement in their planning with a polite but firm, “I don’t want anyone else dead because I helped you.”

Sarah doesn’t so much as let an eyelid twitch, but when Tarissa turns to glance at her son, Sarah gives Savannah a hard look that silences any questions she might have asked in the moment.

Danny is twice her age and angrier than anyone Savannah has met; he’s also the first person who seems to Savannah like he might actively betray their cause. He’s mostly silent, glowering as his mother nods and takes notes in shorthand, but his muttered commentary is far more pointed, with variations on a couple of themes recurring enough that Savannah is convinced he’s either actually crazy or simply convinced that Sarah enjoys killing people.

It occurs to her that she doesn’t know if Sarah’s ever killed anyone. Savannah decides she doesn’t care about the answer. If she has, though, it doesn’t seem like Sarah to enjoy killing, or to do it without reason.

The car ride home is terse and silent. Sarah stares at the road ahead like she wants to set fire to it, knuckles white on the steering wheel. Savannah’s rarely scared of her, not anymore, but it still takes her until they’re pulling into the driveway to ask who the Dysons are.

Sarah’s silent for a good fifteen seconds before Savannah cautiously prompts, “If you’re not going to tell me, why did you want me to come?”

She switches off the car, and, without turning her head, sighs and explains, “Tarissa’s husband—Danny’s father—almost built Skynet.”

“Almost?”

“In at least one timeline, he did. This was back in ’97. Skynet sent a shapeshifter, like—well, you know—after John, and Future John sent regular metal he’d reprogrammed to protect us. An 800. Which it did, mostly, and it told us how Skynet would be created. At least in that future. Miles Dyson believed us, and in the process of destroying everything at his lab to prevent that, he got shot. And then blown up with the lab. So there wasn’t a lot of evidence of anything afterwards. Danny ended up without a father. John and I went back on the run, and he—John, I mean—he started to think we could actually stop Skynet for good.”

“And you never went back and, like, apologized? So they blamed you?”

“I guess. I saw Tarissa a few years ago, back when we were trying to stop it again. Right after we jumped to 2007. She’s pretty much the same. She knows what happened, and what’s going to, but…some people aren’t interested in fighting our fight. And some of their reasons are better than others.”

“And Danny just thinks you killed him?”

“I may as well have.”

“But you didn’t.”

Sarah sighs again. “I walked him right up to his death, and then I smiled because I thought it meant my son would be free. Even if his ended up fatherless.”

“Why did you stop trying? To stop Skynet, I mean? If people are going to die on J-Day anyway…”

“We tried, baby girl. We tried so hard, and whatever we did, someone would die and the machines would keep coming. And John just got further away, until he left entirely.”

“To the future? With—with…”

“Yeah. And then you were there. And you know the rest.”

They both stare out the windshield at the rapidly setting sun for a few minutes before going inside, back to Ginger and the Fields girls.

The Dysons never come to the lighthouse, but Rose mentions seeing a few extra personal-looking items in the Oxnard bunker once.

***

In early December, Savannah wakes up to a headache so bad she flat-out refuses to get up and go running like they usually do. Sarah yanks off the covers in an attempt to make her go anyway, and they both yelp at the unexpected bloodstain seeping through her pajamas. Lauren comes running at the noise, Ginger hot on her heels, but she skids to a stop and bursts out laughing when she spots the cause.

“Sarah, did you not tell her about getting her period?”

Sarah Connor, queen of the impassive stare and doer of great violence, turns bright pink and mutters something about not having had one in two decades. She crosses her arms and hovers in the doorway, absently petting the dog, while Lauren explains the basics of puberty.

Savannah never noticed her apparently budding (if small) breasts until Lauren points them out, and suddenly the extremely alien notion of having a baby is something she can do. She listens and asks questions about hormones and uterine lining for almost an hour before a hungry Sydney wanders in and shrieks at the blood, which somehow sends Lauren into another round of helpless laughter. She goes to calm down Sydney and make breakfast while Sarah—still pink and more tongue-tied than Savannah has ever seen or imagined her—directs her to Lauren’s tampon stash in the bathroom.

As Sarah waits outside the door, Savannah fiddles with the applicator and asks, “So, did you get menopause? That’s how Lauren said this thing would stop. Or getting pregnant.”

“What? No! I’m only forty. Give or take.”

“But I’ve never seen you buy these things before, and it’s not like you’re …”

“Savannah…you know the scar on my stomach?”

“Yeah—ow! Sorry, I’m okay, just poked…um, something.”

“I can’t get pregnant—or, uh, another period. I had all the relevant parts taken out after John was born. Didn’t want to risk it when I had him to worry about.”

“But you said his dad was dead, and you didn’t get married or…ouch.”

“You should probably concentrate on what you’re doing in there, baby girl.”

Sydney spends most of the rest of the morning playing with Ginger in the living room while Lauren and Sarah (but mostly Lauren, who also continues to tease Sarah) explain about sex and related matters. It’s a strange day, to say the least, but it’s probably one of the most “normal” days any of them have had in years, if ever.


	6. 2014

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hover over the Spanish text for English translations, courtesy of Google Translate.

** 2014 **

Savannah turns thirteen, starts wearing a bra, and decides that the medley of people who come and go from the lighthouse should have some kind of share in its upkeep. No one’s going to listen to her complain, though, so she works up a chore chart, with everyone’s contributions more or less proportional to how often they’re around. She and Sarah and Lauren and Sydney are all on it, too—it’s only fair, and Lauren’s not much of a cleaner without encouragement anyway.

She presents the finished product to Sarah and Marty, who are discussing timelines over coffee while the others get a first-aid lesson from Lauren, and Marty accepts it with a kind of mock seriousness that makes her certain he’s on the verge of laughing in her face. “That’s really…enterprising of you, Savannah, but you know we don’t actually live here, right?

Sarah plucks it from his hand, scans it, and asks, “How’d you set this up?”

“Well, I counted how many hours people spend here a month, and then rated all the jobs in terms of how often they have to get done and how gross they are and how long they take, and then the people with more hours got more or longer or grosser jobs. Plus, Sydney can’t really reach the stove to clean it. Stuff like that.”

Sarah examines the page for a few more seconds. “You know, Bedell, we have twenty-odd people coming through here, and it’s not fair that just four of us have to clean up after everybody. Not to mention that that won’t be the status quo once we’re living underground…”

Marty raises his eyebrows. “I guess, but taking orders from a twelve-year-old—I get it, but not everyone will.”

“I turned thirteen a month ago, and it shouldn’t matter anyway—you know I’m right!”

Sarah interrupts, “She _is_ right, Marty. And if taking orders from a kid is a problem, you should get used to it. She knows what she’s doing, and her name was on that same damn list as yours was.”

“You still don’t know why, though. It’s hard to sway people without a reason. No offense,” he adds for Savannah’s benefit. She rolls her eyes.

“I don’t have to know why. She’s smart and capable, tough as hell, and she’s survived more than almost anyone else here. And if you’re too high-ranking to scrub a toilet once in a while, then maybe you can suggest somewhere else we should meet,” Sarah says.

Marty hasn’t gotten as far as he has in the U.S. military for nothing; he knows when to back off and nods his assent. “Right. Savannah, anyone else gives you shit, tell them I signed off on it, too. Guess people should get used to taking orders from you.”

Savannah grins and mouths _thank you_ to Sarah when he glances out the window to where Lauren is wrapping up her lesson. Before she leaves to tell the others, Marty adds, “Could do with something like this after J-Day, you know. All our information makes it sounds pretty haphazard, but if we can have a formal military force, we could probably manage actual military discipline. That has potential. So does she.”

Sarah grins.

***

Jesse Flores only comes by the lighthouse once, in the middle of a clear spring night, bringing a crippled and dying woman wrapped in a blanket. She looks about fifty and claims to be a Resistance soldier from the future, and she refuses to talk to anyone without Sarah present. They settle her on Sarah’s bed, and, while she talks, Lauren patches up the holes where her right shin and forearm had been and makes her a bit more comfortable on the way to death.

Through a mouthful of blood and hacking coughing fits, the soldier introduces herself as Malea Ocampo, 112th SOC, from the year 2028 with orders to find Sarah and make sure she sees the information tattooed to Malea’s arm—a haphazard and sloppy list noting a few key facts: If Judgment Day happens like this, stay underground this long, or longer if it happens this other way. These are places where other big groups will be camped out besides your safe houses. Make sure to stockpile these little things that will make a big difference—condoms, spices, crayons. In thick block letters at the bottom, someone had scrawled the timeless shibboleth: _COME WITH ME IF YOU WANT TO LIVE._

Sarah reads the tattoo quietly and has Savannah write everything down, even the stray marks that Savannah thinks are freckles. She thanks the woman for her service and sits with her as she breathes through her pain. She talks quietly to Malea, with more gentleness than she usually seems capable of—just simple things, like how brave she is to jump back in time and how she’s with friends, no metal in sight. She doesn’t ask when Judgment Day is, or who Malea’s commanders are, or whether John ever returned.

Savannah approaches, thinking _some_ of those questions should be asked—how often did they have a chance at new information about what was coming, after all? And if the soldier is from the future timeline they end up living, all the more reason to find out.

Malea turns her head at the movement and stares at Savannah, wide-eyed but calm. “Oh. Weaver. Guess I should’ve—” She breaks off in a fit a weak but painful-sounding coughs, and Savannah takes half a step back.

“Can it wait?” Sarah asks quietly.

“I just wanted to know—”

“She’ll tell us if there’s anything else we need to know. That’s why she’s here. She has her orders.” Sarah turns back to the dying woman, whose breathing is steadied but still labored.

Savannah retreats into the main room, feeling a little stung and too awake to sleep on the floor of Lauren and Sydney’s room. Jesse is sitting on the couch, staring out at the stars and distant lights over the water, sipping a cup of coffee and holding a lit cigarette, and—to Savannah’s vague annoyance—looking at home as can be as she sits up.

“Connor kick you out, little one?”

She scowls. “No, I just didn’t want to stay in there.”

“Ever seen someone die before? You should get used to it, if you’re supposed to be the new and improved John Connor.”

“I’m not supposed to be him. And I’ve seen people die before.” She’d been eight, and everything with John’s uncle had happened so fast that she had barely understood what was going on until afterwards, but Jesse didn’t need to know that.

“Who’re you supposed to be, then?”

“I’m not in the future you’re from? Malea recognized me.”

“Guess not. Who are you, then?”

“Sarah’s daughter—adopted,” she adds, when Jesse opens her mouth again.

“Ah. Guessed as much. Explains a lot.” The other woman settles back into the sofa.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Oh, ‘s not a bad thing. Just, you move like her. Talk the same, too—direct, no nonsense, no sentimentality. I was watching you at the library for a while, remember, trying to untangle some of that. Figured you weren’t a Connor proper, but _she_ wouldn’t give me much more to go on.”

Savannah discards any concern about having admitted that fairly obvious fact to Jesse—that’s done, for better or worse—and instead asks, “Why doesn’t she trust you?”

“She hasn’t told you?”

“I haven’t asked.”

“Huh,” Jesse takes a drag of her cigarette. “We got off on a bad foot, her and me.”

“Why?” Sarah doesn’t trust easy, and she rarely underestimates people, but her active disdain for Jesse is unusual, especially given that the Australian is more or less in their circle anyway.

“I killed someone. A little girl, bit older than you are.” Jesse sucks on her cigarette again and exhales a neat ring of smoke. “Shocked, are you?”

Savannah is, but she keeps a straight face. “Was she human?”

“Yes.”

“Did she have it coming?”

“Hardly.”

“Then why’d you do it?” That, she realizes as she says it, is the thing, isn’t it? It’s never _whether_ someone—her parents, John’s uncle, Malea Ocampo—died, but _why_.

“Same reason anyone from the future jumps back. To change that future. This is a war, little one, and we’re fighting it across _decades_ , and some of the battles are with our own people. Remember that. I’m not proud of that, but someone had to try. Takes a whole lot of gray to win a war, and we can’t all be Saint Sarah.”

“What were you trying to change?” Savannah asks, ignoring the dig. Jesse doesn’t respond, just sips her coffee and glances out the window again. Savannah prompts, “Did it work?”

“No. I don’t think so, anyway. Hard to tell. I jumped from ’29, haven’t met anybody from my timeline since. Apparently. Connor’s gone either way, right, so I guess we’ll never properly know, will we?”

“Sarah’s not going anywhere—she wouldn’t, she—”

“I didn’t mean her.”

“Oh,” Savannah breathes, and it all makes sense. Of course Sarah would only take the energy to hate someone who had come after her son.

“Who was she? The girl?”

Jesse sighs. It’s hard to tell what she’s thinking. “Nobody in particular. Just a girl without any better options.”

“She’s dead,” Sarah announces from the other side of the room. It takes Savannah a second to realize she means Malea, not Jesse’s victim. “One of you help me bring her outside, keep Ginger in here, and we’ll bury her in the morning. You,” she adds, turning to Jesse, “can sleep there for the rest of the night, but I want you gone by breakfast. And put that out either way.”

Jesse rolls her eyes but drops the butt into her coffee mug. “We all die, one way or another. I’ll just see myself out.” She dumps the mug in the sink and leaves it there. “And you, little girl. Think about what I said—not everybody can be a hero in this fight.”

Sarah rounds on her as soon as Jesse’s out the door. “What did she say to you? I told you ages ago I didn’t want you near her.”

“We just talked,” Savannah counters, a little defiantly. “She said she killed a girl to try to change the future, something to do with John, and that’s why you don’t like her. She didn’t seem very interested in killing me. She didn’t even know who I was. But the other woman did—why didn’t you—”

“What else could she have told us? We know our future. That means we have something to react to, which means we change it anyway. Didn’t you see? She didn’t say _when_ J-Day is supposed to be—just how to survive it. They got information like this in her timeline, too. She’s just passing it on to the next one.”

“But she recognized me!”

“That wasn’t her message, baby girl. What could she have told you? That you’re leading the human Resistance in the future? We already knew something like that. And I don’t want you thinking you’re chained to some destiny.”

“Like John was?”

“Savannah—”

“Is that why he left? To get away from his future because he couldn’t change it?”

“Savannah.” Her tone leaves no room for argument. “I’m tired, there’s a dead woman in my house, and I don’t fucking _know_ why he’s gone, but I can guess, and I’m doing everything in my goddamn power to make sure you don’t have to make the same choices. Or mistakes. So you’re gonna help me move Malea Ocampo outside, and understand that we don’t kill people to make a point. _¿[Entiendes](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/)?_ ”

_This_ is why there are legends about Sarah Connor, Mother of the Revolution, in the future, Savannah supposes. She can comfort the dying and command the living in the space of seconds. “[ _Entiendo ti. Creo ti. Confío ti. Pero yo quiero saber._ _Mañana, o el día siguiente. Tu debes confiar en mí también._](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/)”

Sarah’s shoulders sag, and she suddenly looks less like a leader of armies and more like the forty-year-old insomniac that she is. “[ _Confío ti, mija_. _Otra vez, por favor. No esta noche._](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/)”

“ _Si_ ,” Savannah concedes, and they go to take Malea to her final resting place.

***

The summer lulls everyone into an easy—if wary—complacency, even Sarah. The weather is hot and sunny almost every single day—the words “drought” and “global warming” get thrown around a lot—and none of their military contacts have intelligence to suggest Skynet’s rise is especially imminent. Their safe houses are stocked and everyone who needs to know about Malea’s message does, so the ebb and flow of people slows to the point that Savannah’s chore schedule is mostly unnecessary, though she maintains it on principle, and everyone’s learned to listen to her by now.

Lauren turns 27 in July, just after Sydney hits six-and-a-half, and their celebration turns into a long meal, too much cake, and Savannah’s first taste of alcohol. Lauren and Sarah both laugh at the face she makes at the beer in question, which mostly just makes her determined to finish the thing anyway.

Savannah’s gained a new understanding of the term “buzzed” around sunset when Lauren goes to tuck Sydney in. She idly thinks it’s sweet that they still have their separate sister relationship, even though they’ve been at the lighthouse for about two years now, and mumbles as much to Sarah. They’re sitting on what’s left of the dock, which is basically a board nailed to a pair of pylons but sturdy enough to hold them for the moment.

“I think you’re a little drunk, baby girl. Although yes, it is.”

“You’re the one who gave me beer. I’m thirteen, remember?” She burrows her head into Sarah’s bony shoulder.

“I know. But age is just a number and all that. Anyway, as long as the world doesn’t end tonight, you’ll be fine. Better to know what you’re getting into next time.”

“Oh, see, now you jinxed it…is there going to be a lot of alcohol after Judgment Day, do you think? Because, priorities, and…”

“I don’t know, but humans seem to just about always find a way to drink and have sex, regardless of whatever else is happening. Charming species. Probably why the machines can’t quite beat us. We’re just too irrational about the stuff that doesn’t matter. Or does. You know what I mean.”

Savannah snorts. “I guess I’ll see about the sex part more when I’m older.”

“You’re done with drinking, then? You should’ve seen your face—I wish I had a camera or something.” She chuckles and tilts her head to rest on top of Savannah’s.

“Hey, Sarah?”

“Hmm?”

“There were things you said you’d tell me. Remember? With Malea Ocampo, and…about not having more kids, and that girl that got killed, and the future…”

Sarah sighs heavily. “Savannah…”

“Please?”

“What do you want to know?”

“You know what I want to know. What do you want to tell me?”

She sighs again and starts with what Savannah supposes is simplest. “The girl who died, who Jesse killed; she went to school with John…”

***

The next morning, Savannah wakes up with a slight headache and the assumption that Sarah only talked about Riley Dawson’s short, sad life because of the beer, but when she gets her next period, she remembers to ask Sarah about not wanting to risk another pregnancy. This leads to a surprisingly educational as well as informative discussion on sex as a weapon, threat, commodity, and means of persuasion, layered on top of Sarah’s backstory of single motherhood amid Central American guerillas and smugglers.

Savannah writes out a timeline of Sarah’s life—or as much as she knows about it—and starts a list of questions to fill in the gaps of her adoptive mother’s mostly-mysterious life. She’s careful to ask them when they’re alone for a while and Sarah seems reasonably pliable, but the project ends up being easier than she anticipates.

Sarah fills in the details of the incident with the Dysons and the shapeshifter on a morning run, which prompts Savannah to ask about her imprisonment. She notes details about Sarah’s surviving the metal in ’84 while fishing in the early fall, though she doesn’t bother to ask about the time-traveler who helped her, since he had come from a timeline where Judgment Day happened in ‘97 and so probably wouldn’t even exist now.

Even still, Sarah hardly mentions John beyond the admission that he was present during a given event, but Savannah figures that’s only fair.

She’s pretty proud of herself for framing questions about the period between the Dysons and Cameron’s appearance in ’99 as factual inquiries about hiding and establishing fake identities and so on. She gets answers but makes the mistake of asking a little too much about someone named Charley Dixon, whom Sarah had mentioned in passing, and Sarah stops in the middle of throwing a tennis ball for Ginger to stare at her. “Do you have some kind of questionnaire you’re filling out here, baby girl?”

“No, I just…wanted to know. I’m filling in the blanks. You asked me what I wanted to know, so I’m asking. I figured it’d be easier not all at once, so I’m keeping a list.”

Sarah looks mildly impressed, though she only says, “Fine. But ask me about someone else.”

Savannah adds _Charley Dixon_ to her list with a note to circle back to it eventually; in the meantime, she has questions about how to recognize metal that’s nominally trustworthy, what time-travel is actually like, and why three dots might or might not have been important. Sarah practically seethes whenever she mentions Cameron, though she clearly tries to hide it, and she softens when recalling keeping the other Martin Bedell safe, if technically kidnapped. When she touches on Dr. Sherman, Savannah mentions that John taught her how to tie her shoes, and Sarah actually tears up a bit.

She notices Sarah still skirts around John’s uncle as well as John himself, but one of the few things Savannah doesn’t want to know more about is the man who died so Sarah go and could save her. Besides, he’s dead, like John’s father, and they have a war to fight in the future. Worrying about the past isn’t helpful to anyone.

They both know that Lauren catches pieces of these conversations still, even if Sydney is too young to understand any of them. Sarah doesn’t seem to mind the stray eavesdropping, though she starts taking care to tell some stories—like her abuse in Pescadero, or her early interactions with Mr. Ellison—when the two of them are properly alone.

***

Just after Thanksgiving, when everything is on sale, Lauren corners Savannah at Costco while Sarah is in a different aisle and Sydney is napping in the cart.

“How have you been getting her to talk?”

Savannah pauses in the middle of picking out hand soaps and turns around very slowly, unsure of where this is going. “Why?”

Lauren looks her over, sees her set jaw, and shakes her head. “Not that important, I guess. Just—it’s good.”

“I’m not going to tell you anything—she trusts _me_ , and—”

“Relax, Sav. I don’t want to know what she’s telling you. Really.”

Savannah relaxes—slightly. “What? Really? Why…?”

Lauren shrugs. “I don’t need details to know her life hasn’t been pretty. I know what I need to know to keep Syd safe and help whoever we encounter after J-Day. But she’s been living this life—and then some—since she was, what, nineteen? No one can just be ‘fine’ after that long, not even her. I’d just as soon not be the one to have to keep all of her secrets but…I don’t know, I think it’s good that she’s bleeding out some of her poison, is all. I was just curious how you even got her to talk in the first place. She’s not the most forthcoming person I’ve ever met.”

Savannah shrugs and returns to the soap shelf. “I just asked. I think she didn’t talk about a lot of things with John, and she doesn’t want me to turn out like him, so…yeah.”

“Huh.” Lauren glances at her still-sleeping sister and starts counting out shampoo bottles. “Just…keep an eye on yourself, okay? Carrying someone else’s demons can get to you, too.”

“I’ll be okay,” Savannah insists. “They’re her stories. I just want to hear them.”


	7. 2015

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hover over the Spanish text for English translations, courtesy of Google Translate.

** 2015 **

In late March, Sarah goes on a supermarket run while Lauren is at work, leaving Savannah to watch a now seven-year-old Sydney play fetch with Ginger. Savannah settles in the grass with a book on the history of women in combat that had been Lauren’s gift for her fourteenth birthday, enjoying the spring sunlight and rare sounds of unbridled joy from her charge.

And then, seemingly out of nowhere, a motorboat appears, speeding directly toward them with two figures on board.

The lighthouse is only a few stories high and on a spit of land that just barely juts out into the water. It’s not marked on any maps—Sarah having bribed the appropriate officials a generation earlier—and the only access road is so poorly marked and maintained that they’ve managed to avoid a single accidental visitor in the course of almost six years.

All of this means that the boat and its passengers probably aren’t just stumbling by on a casual ride.

Savannah swallows and takes a deep breath, inhaling and exhaling on counts of five. Heart still pounding, she gauges the boat’s speed and nearness. They probably have a minute before it hits the shore, if that.

“Sydney, go inside.”

“What—but that boat, they…”

“Don’t argue with me,” Savannah uses her best Sarah voice. “Inside. Hide under your bed and pull the blanket over the side like Sarah showed you. And don’t move until you hear me say so.”

“Ginger—”

“I’m going to need her help. Go.”

Trembling but ever obedient, Sydney races back into the house, half-crouching and pausing only to make sure the door doesn’t slam behind her. Savannah hears the faint click of a lock and thinks, _Good girl_.

“Ginger, [_prepárate_](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/).” The dog comes to heel immediately, poised to pounce and staring hard at the approaching threat with a light growl.

In the space of another breath, the motorboat all but slams into shore, and two men in jeans and hooded sweatshirts jump out. One has a shotgun trained on her; the other switches off the motor and produces a revolver in one hand and a nasty-looking serrated knife in the other.

Savannah puts her hands up immediately, keeping her knees loose so she’s ready to move as needed. The motion has the added benefit of confirming that she has her switchblade in the pocket of her shorts and her ever-present handgun secure in the waistband. It’s loaded but the safety is on, which she’ll have to remember if it comes to her using it. She mentally curses herself for not braiding something sharp into her hair that morning, like she sometimes does when they leave the house.

“Tell your puppy to relax. You alone, [_princesa_](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/)?” asks the man with the shotgun. His Spanish accent is faint but definitely present. She hopes this means he’ll try to communicate with the other one, thinking she won’t understand.

“Y—yes. My—my mom went to the grocery store a little bit ago. I don’t know when she’s coming back, but…” Savannah adds a stammer that may not be entirely convincing, but the bad guys don’t seem to care. She strokes Ginger’s head with one hand, slow and deliberate, so the dog relaxes enough for the men’s taste.

“[ _Bueno_](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/). We won’t be staying long, [_princesa_](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/), and if you’re very, very good, maybe we’ll even leave you behind for your mom to find later.”

The one with the knife and the revolver leers at her and she realizes with a start that he’s staring at her chest. Sarah’s warnings about sex as a weapon come to mind, but Savannah’s hardly ever spoken to a man (aside from the military guys in their circle, who mostly treat her like a little sister these days), let alone tried to seduce one. So she sticks with the small-scared-girl tactic, which isn’t entirely put-on, and lets out a little whimper.

“[ _Debe encontrar algo para atarla a_](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/),” the man with the shotgun says to his leering friend, who grins before making the mistake of closing most of the distance between him and Savannah.

It’s as if the last six years of her life were all in preparation for this exact moment. “Ginger, [_atacas_](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/),” she orders, using the hand that had been on Ginger’s head to grab her firearm, flip off the safety, and shoot her would-be captor through both shoulders in quick succession. He falls to the ground, screaming as Ginger pounces and bites savagely into his leg.

The first man seems to be calculating whether to shoot Savannah or the dog tearing chunks out of his partner’s flesh, and he takes an instant too long to decide, giving Savannah the opening she needs to charge and fire at him. Her shot goes wide this time, though, and hits the water with a precise splash.

“[ _Las niñas no deben jugar con armas de fuego_](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/),” the man grins, cocking his shotgun, but not before Savannah rams into him full-bodied, taking just enough care to aim her elbow at his crotch. She kicks off of him as he falls, making him hit the ground harder without being able to take her down with him.

Savannah grabs the shotgun—too big for her but still plenty useable—and aims it at her victim while gently nudging the letch’s bloodied revolver a foot or two father from his reach with her foot.  “[ _Tienes razón, señor_. _Niñas con armas de fuego puede ser muy peligroso_.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/)” She knows her accent needs work, but he clearly has no trouble understanding her when she adds, “Ginger, _[por favor, atacas aquí](http://archiveofourown.org/works/917447/chapters/)._ ”

The German Shepard obliges, sinking her teeth into the man’s neck. The other man is still conscious, twitching feebly and bleeding from bites on every limb. Savannah approaches him slowly, shotgun at ready as soon as she’s sure Ginger has the gun’s original owner sufficiently preoccupied. He stares at her with naked fear and makes a strangled wailing noise. Savannah kicks him swiftly in the temple, making his head jerk sideways like a soccer ball and definitely knocking him out. She gives the first man the same treatment after calling Ginger off, although he’s bleeding so heavily from his neck and upper body that he would probably have passed out soon anyway.

And, just like that, everything is quiet again. Ginger nudges Savannah insistently, and she sets aside her weapons carefully. But when she kneels down to praise the blood-spattered dog, the adrenaline rushes out of her and she’s suddenly hugging Ginger—hanging on for dear life, even—and fighting nausea. The stench of blood everywhere is sickeningly strong, though, and she can feel some of it sticking to her skin. Savannah closes her eyes, buries her face in Ginger’s neck, and makes herself breathe.

She counts up to sixty, willing herself to listen for any movement, and when her heart rate and churning stomach slow enough that she’s pretty sure she can stand and aim a gun poorly if she needs to, she turns and rises. Both men are still out cold. She orders Ginger to stand guard, wipes her hands off in the grass as best she can, and unloads both of the men’s guns before clicking the safety back on her own weapon and carrying the lot inside through the still-unlocked front door. Setting them aside, she digs through the steamer trunk they use as a coffee table-cum-arsenal storage and finds a set of handcuffs and a rope.

Fighting another wave of nausea, Savannah returns outside, where neither the men nor Ginger have moved. She drags the one who had been carrying the shotgun back toward the water, handcuffs his hands together, and ties the chain between the cuffs to one of the dock’s sturdier boards above his lolling head. She coils the rest of the rope around the second man’s abdomen, looping in his arms, and binds his feet together as well. Their motorboat proves to be an empty plastic shell with nothing but a motor attached, so she drags the second man to the water’s edge and flips the thing over to trap him as best she can. A corner lands on his foot, which breaks crosswise with a sickening crunch.

It’s too much. Savannah retches over the side of the boat, chunks of vomit dripping onto the toe of the man’s sneaker. She stumbles a couple of feet into the water and splashes it on her face in an attempt to clear her head that quickly becomes a furious scrubbing of her cheeks and hands and clothing—everywhere that blood has spattered. Then her mind flips to Sydney, who’s safe and should know that but will be terrified of all of this, and she scrubs harder.

Savannah loses track of how she stands there, rubbing her skin raw, but at some point the stench and the stains start to dissipate, and she drags Ginger into the water to rinse off as well. She makes a mental note to set fire to her clothes later. Or maybe blow them up. Dripping wet, they return inside, where she reassures Sydney that they’re safe and warns her not to go or look outside. The girl is shaky but not traumatized, so Savannah has her dry Ginger’s fur while she towels off herself and changes. At least Sydney knows better than to ever ask questions.

***

Sarah and Lauren happen to return home at almost exactly the same time an hour or so later, which means they notice the overturned boat in the back at the same time, which means they both charge into the house, guns blazing, screaming for Savannah and Sydney before Savannah can get to the front door to explain. It’s a good few minutes before everyone calms down enough to sit, and Sarah asks for a recap with deliberate calmness.

“We were just in the backyard. That motorboat showed up, and it was coming right at us, fast, so I told Sydney to hide inside, and she did, and then these two guys started pointing guns, so I shot one of them and hit the other, and then Ginger did her thing to both. Then I knocked them out pretty good. And tied them up outside. Um…” Savannah trails off as her throat closes up and her nausea returns.

Sarah looks between her and Sydney. “You’re both okay?”

She nods. Sarah exchanges a look with Lauren, who takes Sydney to their room. Sarah turns back to Savannah.

“Did they say anything? About what they wanted, or who they were, or…?”

Savannah shakes her head. “They just asked if I was alone, and they said whatever they were doing wasn’t gonna take very long. The guy tied to the dock—he was speaking in Spanish and English. The other one didn’t talk, but he definitely understood Spanish at least. I don’t know if that, um, helps.” She gulps back the need to throw up again.

“How did you know they weren’t metal? I’m assuming human, right?”

“Yeah, they, um, well, the one I shot went down pretty quickly with a bullet in his shoulder. And Ginger didn’t bark at all like you said she probably would if there was metal around…”

Sarah abruptly hugs her close, almost painfully so, and Savannah actually does gag in her mouth a little. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t here for you, baby girl. But you did the right thing, and I am so, so proud of you.” She rocks her a little bit, gently from side to side in a way that Savannah hasn’t been held since she had two parents. It’s strange, coming from Sarah, but it helps, a little.

“What should we do with them?”

“We’ll worry about them in a second.” Sarah pulls back. “Look at me, Savannah. Are you okay?”

“Yes,” Savannah replies, though she knows she’s not remotely convincing. “No. I don’t know. I threw up on the boat earlier. It was just, there was so much blood everywhere, and the smell and—”

Sarah hugs her again. “Yeah. You never totally get used to that. You just learn to deal. I should’ve been here, I’m sorry, I know you haven’t really hit anyone besides me, and with a German Shepard…well. Blood.”

“Are we going to kill them? If they’re not already dead? I didn’t, like, bandage them or anything. They’re probably not going to be able to talk, anyway. Ginger…” Savannah mumbles into Sarah’s shoulder.

“No, but we can’t just let them go. Even if they’re just regular burglars who thought they could handle an abandoned house and a teenage girl…they’ll know we’re here now. And if they told anybody they were coming, they’ll know, too. So.”

“So, they’re…hostages?”

“No. We’ll throw them back into the boat and send it up the shore or something. If they’re lucky, someone will find them and take them to a hospital. But we can’t stay here, baby girl, I’m sorry. We can’t risk having them remember, and if they do…”

“The cops could find us,” Savannah finishes. “You.”

“Yeah,” Sarah says with regret. “And you and Sydney are both orphaned minors, technically, and I won’t let them take you. Not ever. Or put you in foster care. I won’t.”

“So we run.” She’s been aware of the possibility practically since they came to the lighthouse, but they’ve been so lucky and so isolated that the idea of leaving had never really seemed real.

“One suitcase,” Sarah says. “And whatever weapons we can fit in the steamer trunk. Probably not your bow, though.”

Savannah snorts in spite of herself and even laughs a little, and her world feels a little more righted.

***

They end up setting fire to the inside of the lighthouse. Nothing explodes, but they agree that preserving the interior for its sentimental value isn’t worth the risk of allowing anyone to find Sarah’s or Lauren’s fingerprints, or any telling possessions they might have left behind. All four of them do a careful scouring of the house before they leave to remove or destroy anything remotely personal or identifying, but as Lauren points out, there’s always room for human error.

Savannah leaves most of the remnants from her previous life behind but, after some debate, takes the picture of her parents sans frame. It’s not worth taking any chances with leaving it behind.

***

They spend the next six months shifting from motel to hospital to women’s shelter to the trunks of Lauren’s SUV or Sarah’s station wagon. Their stories and names change almost as often. Sometimes Sarah and Lauren are alternately a couple, or sisters, or an aunt and niece. Savannah is usually Sarah’s daughter or Lauren’s sister, and Sydney mostly acts like Lauren’s daughter, a role she’s used to. Sometimes Savannah and Sydney are on spring break from school and road tripping with Sarah and Lauren; other times they’re running from an abusive ex of Sarah’s or helping Lauren move cross-country.  A few times, they even split up in various combinations, although keeping Lauren and Sydney apart seems to worry them even more than it does for Savannah and Sarah, and everyone feels safer with Sarah around.

They don’t actually leave California, though, and ultimately they circle closer to Los Angeles.  The increasingly crowded cityscapes make Savannah antsy, though she manages to suppress most of her nerves out of necessity, and they stay in their rented rooms enough to keep her sane. Sarah takes to wearing sunglasses or a baseball cap almost constantly, and her paranoia, however justified, puts everyone on edge, even Sydney.

Maybe it’s that shared feeling of dread and constant surveillance, but they all agree with Sarah’s premonition that Judgment Day is looming. They’ve been out of touch with the rest of the group since leaving the lighthouse—there’s no way to know for sure if someone sold them out, and they’ve moved too far to relay messages through Jesse with any regularity—but they’ve set up and stocked a few more caches and safe houses where they can. There’s not much left of Savannah’s trust fund anymore, and no new cash flow without Lauren’s income, but it’s not as if they have any reason to save it.

Mostly, they just bide their time, continue to train and condition and prepare…and wait.

***

Sarah is on a grocery run on a crisp September Friday when the ground starts to shake. Their current room is on the ground level of a Super 8 near Culver City, and they’re all native Californians enough to assume it’s an earthquake, until people outside start screaming amid blaring sirens and a deafening buzz of car horns. Lauren and Savannah don’t even have to look at each other to start moving their meager luggage to the SUV, and Sydney follows without a word. Their closest bunker is in Inglewood—normally a fifteen- or twenty-minute drive, but if there are bombs raining down, it’s anyone’s guess. They throw everything in the trunk. Lauren lifts Sydney into the backseat with a distressed Ginger and runs to the driver’s seat.

Savannah stares at the cityscape before her, a little dazed. For a moment, everything moves in slow motion. A haze of smoke is already starting to settle over everything, but she can see the darkened outlines of explosions and their aftermath in the distance. She doesn’t see any mushroom clouds, and the air looks thick with debris, which makes her think that at least they’re not being exposed to radiation yet, like Sarah had worried.

And then, Savannah realizes: _Sarah_.

Lauren screams for her to get in the car. “She’s not here! Savannah—we can’t wait!”

She spins around, braid whipping across her face, and screams, “We can’t _leave_ her!”

“She has the car—she’ll be there as soon as she can. And she won’t thank us for waiting! You _know_ that. Now get in the goddamn car, or we’re going to have to leave without _you_.”

Savannah yells, “No!” and then, like the terrified, stubborn child she is in this moment, screeches into the smoke, “Sarah! _SARAH_!”

Just then, like magic, the station wagon screeches into the parking lot, and Sarah tumbles out without even turning off the ignition. “Were you waiting for me, or—? Fuck that, _move_.”

Lauren lands in the back with Sydney, who’s quietly crying to herself without expectation of comfort, and Ginger, who seems calmer with the little girl’s fingers woven in her fur. Savannah’s in the front seat before Sarah can scream another word; Sarah herself turns on the car and hits the gas.

It’s like a car chase out of a movie; Sarah maneuvers the large SUV through traffic, over sidewalks and lawns, only taking care to dodge people. None of them speaks, but the screams and sirens and increasingly not-distant explosions carry through the car’s closed windows just fine. Savannah grips the armrest on the door so hard her fingernails crack, and even Sarah, who has been preparing for this since she was nineteen, is visibly shaking.

By some miracle, they’re in Inglewood within a half-hour. The bunker is inside and below a mausoleum, which Sarah opens while Lauren takes a ten-minute loop around the nearby area to yell for any survivors to follow her to safety. They’ve prepared a space for forty adults; they end up with twenty-six refugees, including four kids closer to Sydney’s age than Savannah’s.

Savannah ushers people in from the inside of the door, with Sarah just outside, waving to whoever she can spot. After another twenty minutes, it becomes clear that no one else is nearby, and every minute they leave the door open and unsealed is another minute of avoidable risk. Sarah spins inside, yanking the door shut behind her, and they both go to work sealing it while Lauren and a couple of clearer-minded refugees try to calm everyone else down.

When they’re as protected as they can be for the next four weeks—the length of time Malea Ocampo’s tattoo had suggested in the absence of nukes—both Sarah and Savannah collapse against the door next to each other.

Still panting, Sarah turns to face her. “How long were you waiting for me back there?”

“Barely a minute, but Lauren—”

“You know better than that. Savannah—it is _never_ worth risking your life—or Sydney’s—for mine. Do you understand me?  We’re okay for now, but you need to know that—you need to remember that—we’re not always going to be so lucky. Do you hear me?”

“You can’t ask me to do that!” Savannah gasps. She does know better, but, she realizes, she understands why John would choose to rescue his mother rather than run from a T-1000. “Not when—Sarah, you—you’re all I have. Okay? I know my name was on the list, and—and—but you can’t just be _everything_ to me, and teach me all that, and then not—” she breaks off, half-gasping and half-choking back sobs. “I can’t do that. Sarah, please.”

“Oh, Savannah,” Sarah holds her close. “Oh, baby girl, but you have to. You have to.”

Savannah whispers _no_ but hugs her back, and they both take a couple of minutes to calm down. Sarah sniffles and drags the hem of her sleeve across her face. Savannah rubs her temples and does a couple of breathing exercises. They look at each other, and Sarah squeezes her hands. “You ready, baby girl? It’s—everything starts now.”

Savannah nods and rises with Sarah, who whistles sharply to get everyone’s attention. The room falls silent as twenty-eight pairs of eyes come to rest on both of them.

“Okay,” Sarah breathes. “Okay. My name is Sarah Connor. This is my daughter, Savannah. That’s Lauren. This is our home for the next month. Welcome to Judgment Day.”

***

The first few hours had been a storm of terror and confusion, but once they radio to check in with the other bunkers on a one-time-use encrypted channel, everyone mostly falls in line. They all saw the bombs falling and took up the offer for shelter from strangers, so there aren’t as many dissenters or challenges to the narrative Sarah and Marty present as anticipated. Exhaustion and fear go a long way, it turns out; so do military uniforms and Sarah’s ability to put a protesting ex-Marine in a headlock.

They establish contact with eighteen safe houses in total, comprising 376 people, including two groups that had stumbled onto shelters inadvertently. None of the houses are full to capacity, which is a double-edged sword: more supplies for later, fewer guaranteed survivors.

Following Sarah’s backstory, Marty walks everyone through the purposes and procedures they’ve set up in advance, emphasizing not to overuse rations and supplies and offering specific suggestions to the people who don’t have one of their de facto leaders from the lighthouse group on location. Everyone agrees to convene at one of their three predetermined meet-up spots—all places they expect, or at least hope, to find more survivors—in five weeks, which assumes they’ll be limited in the ground they can cover due to both Skynet and muscle atrophy from the time underground. Then they sign off.

There’s a second encrypted channel for use once they emerge, but the silence in the interim is maddening. And even if they were in touch with the others, it’s not as if anyone knows what’s happening on the surface. They’re wholly and completely cut off.

Savannah knows it’s childish to wish for a proper library and an Internet connection and some kind of news source to magically materialize, but she does anyway, although she of course keeps such thoughts to herself. She’s rarely one for imagination, and her categorical and process-oriented modes of thought usually keep away bad dreams these days, but being cut off from the rest of the world keeps her up at night wondering if nukes had gone off on the West Coast recently, rendering Los Angeles much less safe for their emergence.

Sarah, meanwhile, is everywhere at once, answering whatever questions she can about J-Day and what comes next and breaking up the fights and spats that crop up regularly. She offers an extremely limited view of her past to the refugees, Savannah notices, mostly in the service of making sure people know what they need to: Skynet and robots, time travel and multiple timelines, the upcoming human resistance they need to build.

If anyone recognizes her as a wanted-and-presumed-dead alleged terrorist, no one says as much. Either way, Savannah longtime rule of _trust Sarah_ becomes everyone’s watchwords, even if they’re all a little scared of the battle-hardened madwoman who’s assumed responsibility for their lives.

***

The ensuring four weeks are without a doubt the worst of Savannah’s young life.

The air in their shelter is stale and hot and humid, despite their filters, and thirty bodies packed into a closed space turns into a constant panoply of smells escalating from bad to worse that leaves her cross and headachy almost every day. The artificial light is harsh and grating, and sleeping pads are no match for the unforgivingly hard stone floors of the mausoleum. She can hardly extend her arms without hitting someone. There are more people than she’s ever dealt with at once and nowhere to get away from any of them. No one has personal conversations, just one-on-one moments that others opt to look away from.  Most of them are strangers to her and to each other, anyway, and all of the new faces are terrified and restless by turns. “Calm” and “quiet” are relative states; not even during what they call “nighttime” can she escape the maddeningly uneven sounds of other people’s breathing.

There’s no privacy, no sky, nothing soft or bright or comforting, and nothing that’s just _hers_. Savannah can’t breathe, she can’t run, can’t _move_. She’s grown up with big windows and open skies and sea and daily ventures outdoors. She aches, almost literally, for the feeling of a full stomach, well-used muscles, and fresh air. When they do get to leave, they’ll probably still be hungry, and the air is likely to be heavily polluted, but at least there will be _space_.

After the first week, she ends up burying her head in her pillow and screaming every few days or so. The pillow doesn’t muffle much, but the release helps calm her nerves some. Most people do her the courtesy of ignoring the outbursts—everyone has their own variations and frustrations, and there aren’t many places or ways to hide them—but she worries the refugees will see her as an angry little girl, not the budding leader of the survivors of Judgment Day that she’s supposed to be.

That’s why she tries her best to grit her teeth and make do. It isn’t easy, and more often than not, she’s short-tempered and snappy toward the people she’s trying to teach to throw a punch or build an explosive. Physical activity brings limited relief, though; the space constraints and limited water supply rule out most cardio, and there isn’t much they can safely do with weapons at all.

One of the younger women, Mira, leads yoga practices every day, which does help a little, and the intricate training course that Travis, a middle-aged man with twin children a few years Lauren’s junior, designs to give everyone a chance to move and jump and spar without being completely in each other’s way helps even more. Loaded firearms are of course off-limits, just like bombs, but everyone learns the theory, at least. When they get out, though, Savannah’s certain that all she wants to do is actually shoot a gun after running a mile. Intellectually, she knows she won’t be in good shape for doing either at that point, but the thought is enough to keep her going for a little longer.

Three of the refugees are about Savannah’s age, and they quickly fall in together. Sarah suggests she try to socialize with the trio, thinking it might help her vent, but Savannah finds them not terribly different from the peers who had bored her in the libraries up the coast. They’re scared and clueless, and they spend more time than seems necessary crowded around someone’s miraculously not-dead-yet iPod. Plus, they seem scared of her anyway, with her connection to Sarah and training and knowledge, and she’s not interested in dissuading them of that impression. She has a reputation to earn.

Sarah keeps urging her to try again until, a week and a half in, Savannah points out that more than six years of relative isolation and interacting almost solely with adults hasn’t prepared her to deal with other teenagers at all.  That effectively ends the discussion, but Sarah looks so silently apologetic and guilty that Savannah wonders if John had had similar issues with peer interactions. She hasn’t forgotten Sarah’s comment about shielding her from the mistakes and choices John had had to make, and she adds it to the ongoing mental list of questions for Sarah when—or if ever—they’re not surrounded by people.

Ginger, at least, gets along with everyone, and Savannah encourages Sydney to take the lead in teaching people how to instruct the dog, in part to force the quiet little girl out of her shell while Lauren is doing first-aid demonstrations and acting as Sarah’s deputy alongside Savannah. It works, more or less; she’s still quiet, but the other refugees warm up to her in a way they don’t, or can’t, with Sarah, Savannah, and to a lesser extent, Lauren.

In the end, she mostly sticks with Sarah and Lauren, where she’s comfortable. By the end of the first week, they’ve collected a couple of other adults to help lead things—a man called Xin, who’s a computer programmer; Travis, an Iraq vet who before J-Day owned a shooting range; and one of the women, Roxy, who returned from two years in Nicaragua with the Peace Corps barely a month before Judgment Day.

Each of them has a clear head and a useful skill set—plus, Roxy is fluent in Spanish and eager to trade stories about Mombacho and Masaya with Sarah—and they help alleviate the other refugees’ worries about Sarah, as well as Savannah and Lauren by association, by decentralizing the decision-making, explanations, and orders. That was a tactic Sarah, Marty, and the others had agreed to make a priority ages ago—both to avoid retroactively putting anyone else into John’s position (even if they didn’t phrase it that way) and to make the military-type structure conceived for the Resistance feel more democratic and, in theory, more cohesive and effective.

Together, they keep track of everyone’s rations and various abilities and skill sets and strategize how to make the best use of each survivor. True to form, Savannah catalogs everything and by the third week offers up a sketch of how best to organize and equip their party for the trip to the rendezvous point. When she presents the plan to the whole group a few days before their planned departure, no one protests, and, for the first time she can remember, she gets asked questions instead of having them directed as Sarah or someone else.

She may look fourteen, but, she thinks, no one will mistake her for a child again.

***

By a vote of 18-12, they wait two days beyond the four-week mark, just in case. Savannah nearly punches the stone wall, and more than one person rolls their eyes, knowing that a couple of days won’t make much of a difference in terms of making sure the aftereffects of Judgment Day have dissipated.

Still shaking with rage and restless energy, she cuddles against Sarah in an attempt to fall asleep on what will hopefully be their last night. Sarah strokes her hair with an uncharacteristic calm. She’s been tireless and focused for weeks, Savannah realizes, but she’s actually been sleeping and more patient with their group in a month than Savannah can manage most days.

She rolls over to face Sarah and asks, “How are you so relaxed? I’m about to vibrate out of my skin, and you’re just…”

In the dim “nighttime” lighting, she can just make out a ghost of a smile on Sarah’s face. “It’s all happening, baby girl. We survived the worst. We’re not alone. People believe in us. They’re following us. We _saved_ these people, and now that this part’s over…now we can actually stop Skynet.

“No more scrambled timelines. No more hiding and running. No more being patient—now we can _fight_. It’s going to be a shit decade or two, but we can finally stop waiting and preparing and biding our time and actually _do_ something. I’m not relaxed…I’m just ready.”

In spite of herself, Savannah chuckles quietly. “You know, you might really be as crazy as everybody seems to think.”

Sarah actually grins at that. “Probably. But we’ve made do so far, you and me. You feeling ready for what’s next?”

“I’m feeling ready to get the fuck out of this place.”

“It’s not going to be like it was before, you know.”

“I know. But it’s like you said—I’m ready to _fight_. Not just sit around talking about it.”

“Well, that’s pretty much going to be what we’re doing from here on out.”

“Good.”

“Good.”

Savannah scoots back a few inches to give Sarah space to go to sleep, feeling a little better herself. Her eyelids have just started to droop when Sarah whispers her name.

“Huh?”

“Tomorrow, after we—when we meet up with everybody and everything changes. Again.”

“Yeah?”

“Will you stick with me?”

“What—yeah, of course. Who else would I be backing up?”

“No, I just mean…literally. I know you can take care of you, better than almost anybody, but…I just want to keep knowing that you’re safe. As much as anyone’s going to be, anyway. Is that okay? I know you’re trying so hard to be one of the adults, but…you’re still my kid.”

It’s kind of a weird request, Savannah thinks—where else would she be but Sarah’s side? Still, she nods vigorously and lets Sarah wrap her into a hug that settles them both into sleep.

***

The next morning, Travis and the ex-Marine, Shane, open the door. They’re greeted first by a rush of dust, then air that can’t be cooler than 70 degrees or so but feels freezing and utterly wonderful. Ginger is the first to emerge, tail wagging, and she yips happily from a few yards beyond the door for others to join her. Sarah leads the way out, with Savannah at her heels and twenty-eight people behind them.

It’s midday, more or less, though the sky is thick with black smoke. There’s no sign of life, or even movement beyond a weak breeze that stirs the dead leaves on the ground. The cemetery and its surroundings have been leveled, making their band an obvious target to anyone and anything.  She spots a pair of decaying corpses on the road near what had been the cemetery’s front gate, and it’s impossible to look around and avoid thinking about the millions they couldn’t save.

Still, they’re here now, and their past is set. It’s their future that isn’t. There are dozens—maybe hundreds, maybe thousands—of survivors out there, ready to rise up and avenge the world the machines have taken from them.  She hasn’t been naïve enough to think it will be easy since she was nine years old, but if even Sarah can believe they’ll win someday, then so can Savannah.

She turns to her adoptive mother, grins, and sets out to fight the next battle.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [art for 'She's Got To Be Strong to Fight Them'](https://archiveofourown.org/works/934683) by [raktajinos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/raktajinos/pseuds/raktajinos)




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